


Nuclear

by amieangie, yetwhocares (amieangie)



Category: Naruto
Genre: Anbu Haruno Sakura, Anbu Uzumaki Naruto, Canon Rewrite, Character Development, Gen, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Non-Linear Narrative, Smart Uzumaki Naruto, Strong Female Characters, War Rewrite
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-09
Updated: 2021-02-18
Packaged: 2021-03-02 18:27:31
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 7
Words: 87,327
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24051331
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amieangie/pseuds/amieangie, https://archiveofourown.org/users/amieangie/pseuds/yetwhocares
Summary: Maybe Nagato was right when he said there would never be such thing as true peace. Madara vanished from the battlefield and the Alliance broke, leaving its survivors with a war that had just begun. Ten years later, they're still fighting for peace, but these days, the enemies they fight are as much within themselves as they are on the battlefield.
Relationships: Haruno Sakura & Hatake Kakashi, Haruno Sakura & Hyuuga Hinata, Haruno Sakura & Uzumaki Naruto, Hatake Kakashi & Uchiha Itachi, Uchiha Itachi & Uchiha Shisui
Comments: 78
Kudos: 124





	1. PROLOGUE

**Author's Note:**

> I should warn you I have a really, really dirty mouth and if you're an homophobe or sexist, please, leave. And just a spoiler to you: Sakura isn't the helpless, annoying, weak girl. And not only Sakura. Kishimoto should do justice for female characters and, once he didn't, here I am. To make justice about the War and about a shit load of characters and their development and how _certain_ events deserved true attention.  
> Please, enjoy.  
> it is pathetic to ask, but please, pretty please, give it a shot. It's kinda all I have now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  _Read the end notes :)  
> _  
>  Oh, even though philosophers and writers don't exist in Narutoverse, they exist here because idk I feel it makes the whole thing much better.  
> [It kills me slowly when I see that people are uninterested. Because I've been working on it for over a year and I did so much research and poured my soul into it and it has a fucking good plot, k? Don't drop just because it isn't straight forward porn]  
> leave kudos, warm my heart, life I am going crazy

_May 3032, 3 years after the beginning of the 4th Great Ninja War_

* * *

> the horrifying truth of the human nature

What is the **nature** of a **person**? Human **nature** is a bundle of characteristics, including the way of thinking, feeling, acting, since birth. It refers mostly to the everyday habits that don't change untill _we want to._

The **dark side** of our **nature** is our mysterious and fragile underbelly — our negative, but all too **human** , **side**. It may be easier to simply _avoid looking into the darker_ aspects of ourselves and our world — the suffering we see everywhere around us, from real world events to the entertainment we consume.

* * *

WHEN THE WAR KEEPS roaring do you dare to live or do you content on surviving?

When it all began, it was a fight for justice and peace. By now, is there anything that is remotely taken as justice? We fight believing in our own justice. But if the enemy is doing the same, who's right? Who's wrong?

Are there any sides left for us to take, to be grounded, to place our feet upon? Because only the dead have seen the end of war. They're ready to die since the day they swore over it when they tied themselves to serving their village, so that's no surprise. But we're all mislead to believe in our own pain, our only and pure pain and sorrow.

But aren't we all human?

What are we fighting for? 

* * *

"I don't know, Naruto. I guess none of us ever knew." Minato said, leaning in the big rock they were sitting, Kakashi at his right side, sending smoke to the sky. "But if we're to die, we're to die kicking and screaming, bathed in blood and tears, just as we came to the world."

Naruto tried to smile as his father messed his hair, that was longer now, tied in a low ponytail at the back of his neck. It wasn't per choice to let it grow. Where they went he didn't had the benefit of scissors and it was dark to try it with a kunai without putting your neck at line, so he gave up. He liked it now.

Even with the dark circles beneath, his eyes were as blue as the sky above, just like his father's — before it was filled with smoke. From that far they couldn’t hear any screams, but the smoke was so dense they recognized whom was probably behind it.

Birds flew in their direction, coming from West. 

“They arrived earlier than we expected.” Kakashi said, looking at the sky, probably measuring the time by the position of the sun in it. “Fuckers.”

They rose to their feet, ready to fight. Naruto cracked his knuckles. 

Kakashi stepped on his cigarette. It left a black trait.

"Just like the old times." he smiled beneath his mask and vanished as fast as lightning, only a swirl of leaves behind.

Minato shot a smile at his direction that made Naruto want to ask, for the thousandth time, what memory was that it evoked. Kakashi and Minato always had their own jokes — they had it with Obito before he died, too. Naruto didn’t feel out of place or jealous, he just wanted to be part of the family before he lost them.

Earlier that day, when Kakashi was taking a piss, talking to his summons, catching a apple, jerking off, whatever; when his father decided he was far enough not to hear them, he told Naruto that it was in that very rock he told Obito about Sakumo Hatake, Kakashi's father and why he was so restrict and snob.

_(Naruto couldn't picture Kakashi being that way. Rude, arrogant, cold and not even twitching his eyes in another's direction, not caring if someone fell lump at his side. His eyes focused on the blood he was about to gather is his screaming loudly hand, counting the enemies one by one, as a prisoner counts the day that passes. That just proved that Naruto knew nothing at all. Minato would never tell him otherwise)_

It was in that rock they were sitting the whole afternoon, setting traps in a 10 km range, positioning mesh, noose, decoy, genjutsu, illusions, snares, pitfalls, scuttle, watchman, trackers, alarms, signals, everything, that Obito learnt that Kakashi was nothing but the product of a disgrace.

"Naruto?" a sweet voice called from a branch over his head and when he turned around, he saw Hinata, a deep cut in her cheek. She smiled at him, her arm covered in bandages, leaves in her hair and some parts of it were plastered with blood. Nothing new for none of them. “Sakura told you to come North and Lord Forth," she bowed in homage "please, if you may, head East.”

“You can call me just Minato, Lady Hinata.”

She gave him a shy smile, but didn’t blush like she would’ve two years ago. “I can try to work on that.” 

Minato shot them both his big, warm smile and was gone in a flash of yellow.

“What about you, Hinata? Coming with me?” she shook her head, simply basking for something at her belt. 

“This.” she put a scroll in his hand. “Lady Tsunade sent this. And a knuckle in your head, but I am tired.”

He beamed and scratched the back of his neck, the way he did when was nervous about something — a quirk he inherited from both Kakashi and his father.

"Well, won't lie and say I'm not happy about it, but I really hope you're not chakra depleted tired." he said, eyes wild, always afraid of saying something wrong. "Just, you know, tired."

Hinata laughed a bit. "You really don't change, do you, Naruto?"

He couldn’t help but think how _wrong_ she was. 

He thought about Sakura. About how people used to think about her, how people saw her — the giggles and Sasuke, like she had nothing better to think or to do. How Sakura had her knees, thighs, forearms, hands and face splattered with blood and the shake of her hands. How she tried to whip her forehead with her arm and how the blood just spread instead of cleaning. Even Sasuke looked at her that day — _saw_ her that day. 

He thought about the bridge and how much the bridge changed everything. How much Tazuna, Zabuza, Haku and Gato changed everything. The team of cute genin, blind to the hatred and bloodthirsty of the world they were and how one day flipped their world. 

Sasuke and Naruto were too busy fighting Haku and Kakashi was too busy fighting Zabuza, but they all saw when Sakura ripped the throat of that man. And the other man. They saw the tears streaming down her face, but the gleam of her green eyes looked more like a warning than an inviting. 

_(Naruto always saw Sakura smile like a small star collision, impossible to tear your eyes away and beautiful in all its charm, the strongest weapon of her arsenal, until that day when he saw that her will to live screamed like a child ripped from its mother’s arms — he knew the sound way too well, ‘cause he had to do it more often than he liked to admit.)_

All the blood they shed after the bridge was their downfall. 

Everyone still saw them from what they _tried_ to be: children. Sakura tried, Naruto tried, hell, even Sasuke tried. They laughed and fighted and bickered and Kakashi rolled his eyes and they painted fences and rescued cats and _assassinated_. There were days they felt worse than ANBU and days they felt like what they were: fucking children. 

With the burden of blood in their shoulders, they finally understood how Itachi and Obito did what they did at such young age — they were doing the same.

And Hinata, like that, crouched in a branch, ignorant of their past, her clothes torn, her hair fucked up, some scars now for play, she looked much more like the Princess of the Byakugan then she looked when she was calm and collected.

Naruto wished he could say that to her, but he couldn't find the words.

So he just smiled at her the best of his smiled, the one that always screamed _Naruto_ and could brighten the day.

The ground shake beneath their feet and, with a last smile, Hinata sunshined away in a swirl of lilac.

Naruto, too, looked different (his exterior). The War was wavering its tool on him. He didn't use orange clothes most of the time now. Orange clothes were too much Naruto and Naruto was too much of a target — even though, they all were too much of a target lately.

He learnt to control his temper and to turn Kurama's mode into something that didn't resemble neon, because neon doesn't serve well in battlefields.

His eyes were brighter now because his skin was darker from standing so much in the sun and not always in the Leaf — they spend a shockingly amount of time at the Sand and the weather there was a bitch.

The curtain of smoke was growing thinner, so he jumped from the rock. He liked that rock. Too bad it would be nothing but crumbs in the matter of minutes.

When Naruto read the scroll he couldn’t help but smile. 

With one last look he took the view in. It all looked peaceful. It was a shame the last thing he thought before disappearing in the same lighting speed as his father, was that a beautiful moment happened there.

He could hear the screams them. And see the gigantic blue and purple figures rise to fight each other — Susanoo'os (Sasuke’s and Madara’s). It was about time, already.

Naruto felt Kurama moving inside him and a smile formed in his lips — a smile only war can forge, rough around the edges where it can strike and rip your skin in the places that hurt the most. 

"Naruto?" Kurama asked inside his mind "Do you miss him?"

The smile flattered, but not entirely. He was no longer that boy and for a long time now. 

"You can miss something and not want it back, Kurama."

So it all fell in muteness - _destroy what destroys you._

(Bukowski was wrong. Don't just _find what you love and let it destroy you._ When you least expect, your thoughts are killing you and there's no escape from within, you cannot run from yourself.

Hilda Haist was right.

“Where do the trains go, father?”

“For Mahal, Tamí, for Camirí, spaces on the map, and then the father laughed: also nowhere, my son, thou can go and even if the train moves, thou doesn’t move from thyself”.

You're trapped and this is both beautiful and terrifying. We're only layers of skin hiding bones and those are too fragile. 

Kakashi sat with him by the fire three nights ago; his father was running the perimeter along Shikamaru and he was with Sakura and a bottle of something strong. 

"I wish I could tell you time heals all wounds," he began, taking a last sip before passing it to him "but we both know the more time you have, the long the list grows."

It was about time to put an end to it, whatever it means.)

No more beautiful moments to happen there.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heeeyyy! I reeeeallyy hope there's someone here. I really do. I've been trying really hard to make this work and I am reposting this because I wasn't happy with the original and I am still completely scared my fic is just pure and utterly shit.  
> Before all: it might seem sometimes I have no idea what I am doing, but I do know, k? I introduce a LOT of infos in a way that may look haphazard, but I know very well what I am doing. Very, very well. But gotta open my heart, uh? Anyway. I do know every single think. This is Chekov's Gun. Like, even the colour of the walls have a meaning. This is like the project oft life and it is killing me slowly to see it doesnt reach public. But, well, shit happens. I won't abandon it ever, so if someone's out there: I am not that depressed the whole time. Just rambling. [EDITED]  
> It's non linear and I do swear like a sailor, but it is good. Well, my ex said so.  
> It will cover the ground of their Gennin years, the pre war, the war itself, the past of the characthers, their motivations, the brutality of what being a ninja is, the affair between clans, loyalty, loneliness, the politics, etc and there won't be Kaguya 'n shit because i think Kishimoto was just like "holy fuck, Madara is too strong so I will just get a goddess out of my ass". And I intend to portrait war with more realism and talk about things like alcoholism and drug abuse, but I cant make angst too angst. Idk.  
> NOW THE MOST IMPORTANT PART: this ISN'T a really romantic fic. It depends on the reader. The pieces are on the table, you decide on how to play with them. You can face the conversations, the proximity, the friendship, camaraderie, everything as romance/sexual tension or you can face it as nothing sexual. It is up to you. If you want to see something juice coming from the characters from THIS fics, leave a comment and I will write it separately.  
> I repeat: IT IS NOT PORN WITHOUT PLOT OR ANYTHING LIKE IT. It is plot with plot.  
> Just give it a try. Pretty please.


	2. How to Disappear Completely

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There will be some violence here, but well there was Icha Icha _Violence_ so who knows what Jiraya wrote and we may be prepared for it, uh? (That excuse was worse than all of Kakashi's piled with whipped cream on top)  
> and I love playing the pronoun game: you will be in the dark for a while, not knowing if a certain someone is a man or a woman or they identity for a bit.

_November 3031, 2 years after the begging of the 4th Great Ninja War_

* * *

We all have a bit of _"I want to save the world"_ in us, that's why we're here, in the shinobi world; that we were there, in the Academy. I want you to know that's ok if you only save one person and if that person is you.

Part of me died in order to survive. I may grow again, but never will be the same.

> Now, we're just strangers with the same memories. 

* * *

"I thought you were dead." 

"Well, didn't every one?" 

"You were supposed to be dead." 

"Well, didn't every one too?" 

"What?" 

"What?" 

"What does this mean?" 

"What?" 

"The “everyone should be dead” part." 

"Oh." 

"Oh?" he asked with his brows raised, his face twisted with annoyance. 

"I heard we were kind of extinct." 

"You sure as fuck were. Then” he stopped himself just as he as about to say “Madara” and tilted his head to the side, searching for something in the man — something he didn’t find. So he continued as if he never stopped. “Madara came out of nowhere, then Obito climbed through the gutter, then even fucking Itachi appears to me—" 

"Itachi appeared to you?" 

"Then _you —_ " he was cutted mid sentence. 

"What do you mean by Itachi appeared to you?" 

"Really?” his voice was the perfect mix between annoyance, disbelieve and total blankness — the latter winning as all good interrogator has to. “That's the part that caught your attention?" 

"Kinda." 

"Fuck you." he said pointedly, stating with the same emotion he uses to go _please, excuse me, thank you_ at the market. He then exhaled, shaking his head, lighting the cigarette in one fluid motion. 

Recovering from showing one speckle of emotion, his fist covered in energy met the man’s jaw straight, making two teeth fly out. With a loud sigh that could be mistaken by a course, a weak green chakra checked him and let him at a situation stable enough to continue the interrogatory.

“Shit fuck, that hurt.” the man said and spit blood to the side.

“That’s what you get when you try to fuck around.”

“I wasn’t!”

“I am the one that does the questioning!” the voice reverberated through the walls with the same strength his lightening used to do. He was made of electricity. The man in the chair didn’t budge. 

“I just wanted — you know me —”

“No, I don’t.”

“Come on, for the old times.” 

Two teeth missing didn’t stopped the man from shooting a blinding smile that didn’t carry all the brightness that Gai’s had, but it had some shepiness glee that makes your lips quirk up immediately. 

“Give me something. _Now._ ” The sound of chirping birds began to tweet in the room. A exasperated gasp was heard in front of the man and his smile fell.

“You’re not going to Chidori me.” his voice was way too cracky and desperate to be nonchalant. Chidori was well known. Only the sound of the birds fighting to be the one chirping the loudest answered him. “Are you?” Louder. “Ta-”

“Don’t.” His voice was as dead as all those who met the end of the ball of electricity in his hand. “Don’t call me that. Tell me what do you know. Now. This is the last chance.”

“ _He_ wouldn’t like if you did that.”

The man didn’t even finish the sentence before Kakashi was over him. He flew straight to the ceiling due the way he aimed and his chair broke leaving his body to fall lump on the floor, just one of his ankles still tied and his left arm with the chains, but the wooden arm of the chair gone. 

“What the fuck, Hatake? I thought you were going to Chidori him!”

“You thought I would murder a fucking man that surrounded himself peacefully offering intel and information without asking nothing in exchange?” 

He had only one eyebrow raised and gave just an eye corned glare. He smiled reassuring anyway. “We will get there.” 

He turned his eyes to his forever present book. Except that the book that was open in his hand had none of the letters of Jiraya’s, but the infos they gathered the last months. As he had an infinite collection and very were the same copy, not even the special edition or anything like that, he sacrificed the books, turning them into endless pages of data, scoop they could obtain. 

Since Madara flet the battlefield over an year ago, they had to deal with was left: nothing. 

Their only connection to Madara was Obito and he was now dead. Kabuto and Orochimaru were out of the picture as well, so the Allied Forces dig the whole Great Nations over anything useful. They dug up out ghosts, ditched out rivalries, scooped every single inch of everything. All scrolls they could lay hands onto, all bandits they could snitch, all underground labs, hide outs, _every fucking thing_. Still, they always came back empty handed. They had dozens of undercover missions ungoing, but what were they really undercovering in? The allies? Once they were all in the same boat, that seemed to make everything harder. 

Working together was faster. It wasn’t easy, though. The tension between the nations was building up again. Day in, day out they found rogue ninjas attacking each other’s lands. One year may not seem longer, but into a world used to be with a kunai at its embrace into the sleep, every feather seems a threat. One year ago, the only threat was Madara and all the puppets; now he was out of the picture and everyday he was looking more and more like a faded nightmare, so it was easy to see enemies in the ones that were right in front of you. 

The distrust was rising, mostly, because of the random attacks - that always seemed to leave a mark behind that sounded too close to comfort like the signature of another one of the nations. They kages had been in touch with each other almost every week to make sure the peace would remain.

Everyday the attacks didn't seem to be so random anymore nor reckless. They seemed to have purpose, to have targets. To have _knowledge_ \- of them, of what they did, how they fought, whom they were. It was sound way too much like a _déjà vu_ for anyone to be at ease.

Nothing happened yet, but everyone felt in the air it could happen at any minute. 

And Sasuke disappeared so timed in perfection with Madara that even the man himself might’ve have been suspicion. The Five Nations were beyond suspicion about Sasuke for ages now; they wanted to feast on Sasuke like wild beasts. They were fucking wrathful - if they wanted Sasuke’s head before, now they wanted it toasted and shappened into little flamingos. 

The Uchiha should be extinct. 

A groan made Kakashi take his eyes out of his annotations and the sound of two bottles put down on a table, a pair of eyes turning its attention to the man on the floor..

“Mornin’.” he said with his forever eye crease. A snort was heard. 

“That really hurt. I thought you were going to kill me.”

“I don’t kill and tell.”

Despite the blood coming from his nose and mouth he laughed and if his arm wasn’t broken and hurting so much he could’ve even point at him and say “I saw what you did there”. But it was hard to breath. 

Kakashi was leaning onto one chair in the fair middle of the room and brought it to the middle, sitting the man in it while the green chakra made sure he wasn’t to die. Relieving the pain, however, wasn’t part of the deal (yet).

"Yeah, he appeared to me." Kakashi said out of nowhere while the man was finishing being tied to the chair. 

_(The healer was making ridiculous purposeful amount of strength to tie the man to the chair when Kakashi said that. At his words, a gap, a crack into his armor, the shock was so that by turning the head so fast a twirl of hair hit the man square in his face and the locks became heavy with the amount of blood. It was completely washed in blood in the mere seconds it nested in his face. Some people would add some relief of pain, would be shaken in the face of the raw nature of interrogation. But in that room, there were not innocents. They all had seen their amount of interrogations and seen their amount of collateral damage when they don’t cooperate. The healer didn’t took pity - his arm was pressed harder and his eyebrow bled more.)_

"When I died." Kakashi was looking at his book, his finger running over some words - for once, he was actually reading. 

"What?" the man still had the vocal chords to sound _loud_.

Kakashi just kept examining the dossier, making a mental note here and there. 

"Really, I mean it." the prisoner was suddenly very serious. 

(" _Oh, that you want to talk about?_ " A third voice raised, the anger in those words poisonous enough to melt the floor. That was sushed with the wave of a hand. Kakashi didn’t miss the way those eyes widened at him and how he wasn’t yelled at because the mouth was too busy gaping. The man didn't see it.) 

"You died too?" 

Kakashi said nothing, and the room was filled with nothing but the angry breathing and the blood trickling in the floor. 

One step was taken in the direction of the man, a fist closed, knuckles already smudged. He wasn't in that beat up condition for nothing. _Shit, no_ Kakashi whispered so low it was a doubt someone besides him heard. 

"How?" he asked in a zippy tone.

The man seemed eager to know, like a puppy waving its tail when his owner comes home. ( _"I am going to rip his head"_ Kakashi made another shush hand and " _I am going to rip your head—"_

He hissed under his breath. _Calm down_ he said, it seemed. _The fuck I will_ , something akin was said. The man laughed. He was signing his death sentence and didn't even know.) 

Kakashi decided it was for the best just to say it already.

"Yes, I did. I died."

The confession didn't seem to ease his eagerness. 

"I got it, but how?" 

"Why do you care?" 

"Why not?" 

"You haven't spoke shit since you've come here. Why should I say something?" 

"Dunno." he just shrugged. 

His nose was broken and his voice was a bit nasal, some blood dripping down his chin. His left eye was a deep purple with black on the corners and two of his fingers were broken. He was fighting against the pain, breathing hardly, but was still humorous. It was amusing to watch.

Kakashi got fucking tired of it. 

Before another threat came from over his shoulder he punched the man. And again. And again. He punched him about nineteen times before he passes out. The main focus were his nose, his chin, his stomach and a prod just for good on the crotch. 

A whistle followed by a “Oh my” and Kakashi thought it was Anko in the room. “Didn’t know you had it in you, Hatake.”

“You sound like Anko.” that seemed to be an insult good enough for him to be left alone.

He went to check in his book and they stayed in silence. He was trying to see if he missed somehow, somewhere how that man was alive, how they would have overseen something like that, something that big.

When his eyes were losing focus over the letters on his book, he looked over the man splattered on the floor, the strong green chakra into his chest, he decided it was time enough of a interrogator-break - if such a thing existed. He just didn't want to do _this_.

“How is he?” this time he was hand shushed and he fought the urge to roll his eyes. After a few seconds he felt his patience wearing thin. “Are we really -” 

The hand came up again to shush him. 

“Don't be a child there, Hatake. Be quiet.” he lighted a cigarette. “Oh, and light one for me too.” 

With one cigarette in his hand and the other in his mouth, the woman came to sit by his side at a table. 

“Why did you shush me?”

“His chakra paths.” she took a deep drag and went silent. 

“That is fucking magnificent. What about it?”

“They are working in perfect condition, but I notice I was the first one to touch them, heal them in ages.”

“How long would “ages” be?”

“Over ten years.”

Both his eyebrow rose until they were lost in his hairline. 

“That is downright impossible."

"Uhum. In a ninja word, with ninja fights, with ninja healers."

“How long is he here?” 

“Six days, Kakashi. You told us to only call you if we couldn’t get nothing.” her voice was much more soft now.

He ran his hand over his face and took a drag and a sip. A ton of papers were all over the table. All the notes they took of what the prisoner said. The things they got were in the line of

_"I heard old man Teuchi is ‘bout to get some concorrence”;_

_"When I was four, we had a swing that the older man, just imagine that, set on fire when they had a fight. If they fought a lot? You tell me.”;_

_“My dog died when I was on a mission”;_

_“I hate spicy food most of the time”;_

_"Land of Water fucking sucks at winter”;_

_“I once met a man with a ginger hair that had his own punk band and he was good on mosh pits. You don’t know what is a mosh pit? What kind of interrogator are you?”; “_

_"My mom was a kunoichi, thank you very much, we used to get takeouts or to get food from my cousin”;_

_"Yeah, I had a girlfriend once. How that’s not what you asked me? You asked me to tell you something.”;_

With both hands in the table, he leaned into it, looking at all the papers scaterred, sparse, aplenty papers. They took notes on all the official things he said (that were mostly bullshit), his state, his body heat, his weight, his condition, his diet, his reflexes, his official record when he popped in. Everything. All they had on him on the past, all they gathered now. They were trying to make sense of a puzzle with missing parts. This prisoner was the missing part of a grand picture.

He was sadly set aside, because right after him a firework show exploded and he went straight to a locker that had tons of dust when they looked into it now.

“It has to be something here.” 

“You are the genius.”

He gave her a dark look, which she just shrugged off, but he saw the thin lines in her lips. 

“Kakashi,” she called over from her place in the table after a while, he just hummed, not even lifting his head, “we are gonna laugh of this stupid shit one day.”

“I know. I just wish I was fucking laughing now.”

“Well,

“ _When I lost my virginity, you see, it was with a civilian girl, fuck clan shit, but she actually said another man’s name. Yeah, that hurt.”_

or

“ _Once my team captain had gonorrhea."_

She pointely looked at him and he just gave her the middle finger, which made her laugh. “Really, I want to make him swallow his teeth, but when he’s unconscious I feel less murderous and, come on,” she grabbed a piece of paper, looking rather proud of herself, “ _I remember vividly having a nightmare of a wood-faced terrifying man.”._ I bet Tenzo would be proud of himself. And if he knows Tenzo -”

_“Yamato.”_

“Oh, fuck off. If he knows Tenzo and know his creepy face we’re just…” she sighed, putting the papers back, but Kakashi understood. He was looking at paper after paper and searching over his book. 

“Something is missing.”

“ _My teeth.”_

“Ready to talk?”

“‘Can try’.” the man was obviously now struggling with speaking, so the woman healed him superficially, making sure no vital points were affected and helping with his teeth. He tried to mouth a thank you, but didn’t quite manage with the amount of blood coming out of his mouth. 

Kakashi had a pained expression on his face. None of them could see, both had their backs to him. She was healing and sitting him more properly and Kakashi was left looking at them, his arms crossed in front of him, his back to the wall, the table with the man's life at his side. Maybe one day he could describe to someone how much it was for him to conduce this interrogation. 

Once the man was sitting in the chair, his features now recognizable and less swallow, but still bruised, Kakashi, again, just blurted, his voice as impassive as ever. 

"Pain, from the Akatsuki. He killed me when he invaded the village." 

"And how are you alive?" 

"I could ask you the same." 

The man hissed a bit when he tried to take a deep breath — his rib was broken, and the rest of him sure as hell wasn't okay. With just a look Kakashi signalled for the man to be partially out of pain - he looked about to enter in shock.

_(When she kneeled to heal him, she didn't care anymore. Her hair was still plastered with blood and she could feel it tickle her face. Looking at him, for the thousandth time, never lost the same effect. Not having his eyes to look back at her was worse than being stared at.)_

With a sound of relief and the sound of a cigarette being smashed into the floor he simply said: "How did Itachi appear to you? Was he still alive?" 

Clearing his throat, Kakashi fled the question. 

"You were right on "everyone should be dead", but apparently no one really dies, do they?" 

"They kinda do." the man said matter of fact, lifting just one shoulder, his face telling them he oughta be really helpful stating that.

"Who died?" 

"Do you want to do this in chronological order?" 

It was the limit.

Tsunade hit the table with her hand so roughly it broke the thing in two, leaving some dust up (and messing up completely all the papers). All Kakashi could do was sigh. 

This time Kakashi's hand couldn't shush her and she seemed ready to rip his hand off. Tsunade didn't like to be shushed. She only agreed on staying in silence and not letting all of her healing chakra take place because Kakashi thought it was better for her to remain unknown as much as possible. The man didn't seem to know she was once the Hokage so he could be kept in the dark a while longer. 

"Stop shitting me, you brat. Start talking or you won't be able to feel the relief of a healed wound until another one is made." 

"So, it really is the Slug Princess. It is a honour to finally meet you." 

Tsunade didn't seem flattered as she pulled the man in her direction with enough strength to dislocated his shoulder to which he howled with the knockdown pain. 

"Tsunade!" Kakashi hissed, again, now saying her name, when he took her hands out of him and she let go off him, letting him fall as a piece of pudim. He was still holding her hands and even though he was much taller than her, she was looking him in the eye and what seemed to be the beginning of a _I’ve told you already_ discussion the man said, for the first time in almost one week, something worthy

“He used to always talk about you.” he said in a relaxed tone, even though he had now one more bone in his body causing him pain. 

“Who? Who, boy? Who talked about me?” Tsunade was over him, grabbing him by his shirt again, but not so violently. 

He smiled, toothless, but his eyes turned to her, as if he was happy. “Orochimaru.”

Her hands glowed green without him saying anything. In a heartbeat all his injuries were healed, but she didn't give him the benefit of the pain release. Just bones mending and bruises leaving without the numbness they could put with their chakra. 

“So, I take you still care for your old team mate?”

“Do you?” Kakashi asked back and the man, for the first time, retracted into himself. Tsunade lifted one eyebrow. 

Orochimaru wasn’t a taboo between them, but it wasn’t discussed without the presence of everyone. It was for the best, they decided.

When it came to Orochimaru, the dicussions always pointed to everywhere and nowhere. He was always in the middle of something and in nothing at all. There were times Orochimaru seemed the best shit ever, the man that was everywhere and knew everyone, managed to get into ever hole, but the truth was that he was trying to survive and he was just half good at it. None of them feared him like they used to when they were young. He was just another rogue ninja. 

But, an interrogation seemed to be the very exception to explore the topic and he was so talkative out of nowhere, but Orochimaru had betrayed them so many times they wouldn't risk it. It could be just him throwing a bait after he didn’t have anything else. Orochimaru was always an ace upon the sleeve.

Tsunade made a point to heal him terribly slowly, mostly making pressure over his wounds and causing more pain before the healing end. 

"Tsunade..." Kakashi said, asked tiredly and, after a few seconds, she gave in and the man was ready to go. She left a bruise with the shape of her hand over his arm, though. 

"Okay!" the man raised his hands, bruise in place, in not-so mocked surrender. "Okay. I will collaborate." 

"You don't have to "collaborate", kid. That word we use to _war_ prisoners, _nice_ war prisoners. You came for yourself. Even though I'm beginning to think we should've thought of something a bit worse for — Oh, finally!" She interrupted herself and turned to the door. 

Ibiki marched in, just shooting a look at the broken table and placed a few tools at the floor, just where Kakashi had stepped on his cigarette. 

(It's funny how it always left black traces. Asuma's didn't.) He then handed a small bottle to each Hokage-ish in the room and left a bigger one beside the tools. Tsunade whispered something that sounded a lot like "set the boy on fire for a show" to which Kakashi regarded her with a hard look over his drink. In the top of her magnitude Tsunade stuck her tongue out and Kakashi was left wondering if Sakura and Tsunade hadn't overpass the limit of time one can spend with another. 

The door closed with a click and Ibiki stepped to the middle of the room, his hitai-ate hiding his bald battle scars. His face was as dangerous as always. 

He looked the man from head to toe. Took in his mischievous hair, his riven clothes, the way the dry blood was all over him, his dry lips with fresh scars — the fresh scars all over him from the interrogation, the old scars from his life, the way his smile was boyish under the layers of pain and hours of torture, the absence of his eyes, two shallow spots regarding him back, his hands with bones in awkward positions. Everything in him screamed homeless plus interrogated and that image never was pretty. The smile, still, was out of the picture, escaping the frame.

"So it is true. You're alive." 

"Pretty much, uhum." 

"And you came back with an attitude" 

"Wouldn't say I did-" 

"I wasn't asking." 

"Oh" 

"Okay." 

He double checked the boy again and turned to Tsunade 

"What do we have?" 

The eye exchange between her and Kakashi wasn’t missed by Ibiki. 

"We have a lot of my patience lost in here. I swear to God I didn't threw a chair at his face 'cause there isn't any here despite the one he's sitting." 

"Yeah, I know," Kakashi said, rolling his cigarette in his fingers "I asked them to remove anything that could be thrown.” 

"What? Why the fuck? I could've- this could've gone a lot faster if I- how dare you?" 

"Tsunade!" the woman fixated her gaze at his face, her face flushed and looking like she could throw him. "Calm down. You're not good at the whole information gathering" 

"What?" 

“You need to keep your cool." the man answered instead of Kakashi, flashing a smile, like he was being truly helpful. 

"Oh, you brat!" 

Apparently, both men forgot how fast Tsunade could be because in a blink of an eye the man was punched to the wall that cracked minimally (interrogation rooms have to have the strongest walls for obvious reasons, but _of course_ Tsunade would be able to crack it).

Kakashi sighed with a hand in his temple and felt he was again dealing with a team of gennin. 

"Tsunade! Jesus Christ, calm down.”

“Why the fuck would I calm down? We’re walking in circles. This fucker probably came here just to seek shelter.”

“We’re still at peace.” Ibiki said plakant and still with his face resembling a doberman ready to jump and drool between his teeth. 

“For the moment.”

“You ruined the chair, Tsunade.” Kakashi pointed. 

“Fuck the chair.” she was fumbling, tidying up her clothes, dusting them off. They looked at the man laying at floor - for the third time of the day. He wasn’t moving. “Oh fuck, don’t tell me I killed him.”

“You didn’t.” Kakashi waved with his hand while he was handed a chair by the door. He raised the man of the ground with one hand and set him with another. This chair didn’t have arms, just a seat and a backboard. He was slipping out and Kakashi had to hold him to avoid him from falling face flat to the ground

“He’s out again.” 

“Why are you giving me this look, boy? Every punch this boy took was well deserved. Now wake him up.”

“You’re the medic.”

“Enough with this bullshit.” Tsunade hit the ground with her feet and it made a whole on the concrete. The floor was also harder than the regular ones. “Enough! I am not going to be shushed anymore nor suppressing my chakra.” She marched in the direction of Kakashi. “Get the fuck out of my way.” he rose up carefully, eyeing her strangely. She put both hands in the man’s temple. “Wake the fuck up, boy!”

The man jolted awake and his not-eyes (his sock balls) widened, his back straight. 

“I’ve had enough of this. I am the Fifth Hokage and you all will treat me as such. You included, Hatake. I don’t care you wear the hat now. I will not bow to no one, kid.” 

Knowing better than trying to placate her, Kakashi just shook his head in understanding and let her. 

“Ok, kid, I am sick tired of this. You haven’t proved being valuable to us so far. We can feed you to the wolves in the blink of an eye. If you just marched here thinking your name would protect you, you were dead wrong. You are lucky you are alive, because your name is almost a curse here and you should've known better.”

“I do know.” his voice was throttled, but serious. “I know about my name.”

“Why did you use it then?”

“Would you hear otherwise?” 

His voice was tired and broken, his gleeful lost in the cracks of the wall. 

_(It clicked inside Tsunade. She had a jumpstart based on her descendance. How serious would she be treated without being a Senju? At her time, during the Second War, women were nothing but medic-nin. She became a Legendary Sannin. But would’ve she even have had the chance to try to prove her worthy without this backup? She was just a girl like many others. She would have remained the same. People were now threatened by her intelligence and her strength, but would the Third Hokage took her under his wing if she was just a blonde temperamental girl? Would he value her? Or she would be what Sakura were to Kakashi?)_

“In the end, all you have is your name.” he said and smiled and she could fucking see her little brother there, in that smile. Not all the ninja had to say they wanted to be Hokage to shatter her with her grief. That man managed. 

In the silence that stretched, Tsunade kept eyeing him, until she gave him her back and drunk with drops falling over her chin. 

“What did he tell you?" Ibiki asked, massaging his temple. 

Ibiki was a very collected and closed man. Very few people managed to get on his nerve and Tsunade was one of those. 

"Nothing!” the moment passed. The man smiled. “He didn't tell me nothing! Not one useful thing. And then Hatake decided it was better if he didn't know it was me." 

"Hatake was right." 

"I fucking know Hatake was right." if she could throw something or slam her hands at something, she would've. Instead, she just waved her hands and her hair was falling loose. "It didn't fucking work. The boy knew it was me." 

"What did he know?" 

"About the village?" Kakashi answered leaning into one pilar. "Not much. He was alien to most news, so he didn't know about me being the Hokage and knew mostly about whispers about Tsunade, nothing concrete." 

"The War?" Ibiki raised his eyebrows. 

The I&T usually (never) discuss anything in front of the prisoners, but this one was different. There was no need to hide these things from him. It wasn’t like they were discussing the nothingness he gave them so far.

"Didn't fight in it." Ibiki wrigled a eyebrow but Kakashi waved him off, taking another sip. "Was at a civilian village, but protected them through Madara's." 

"The whole month?" his voice was cruel and dead as ever despite the surprise.

"Uhum." the three of them turned to him. "I was very helpful. Not completely useless." 

In a flare of chakra that seemed to heat the whole room Ibiki summoned The Cage. Tsunade's lips quirked in a cruel smile. Kakashi drank. 

Apparently, the man’s good humour was the last thing people wanted from him. On the other hand, he was perfect on pushing people’s strings.

Immediately, he was out of his chair and pressed against the iron cell, straps closed over his wrists and ankles.

"Why aren't you cooperating?" Ibiki said marching in front of him.

"I am!" it was impossible to tell if he was joking or not.

"You aren't." Kakashi reminded him in a way that sounded a lot the way he talked to Naruto when he said something stupid. 

"What do you know about Madara Uchiha?" 

"Almost nothing." 

"Almost?" 

The man cringed. 

"I know what everybody knows. Legendary shinobi, founder of The Leaf, came back from the dead and started a war." 

"And that's all?" 

"That's all." 

"Why should we believe in you?" 

"Why not?" he asked in some tone akin defiance. Morino _hated_ defiance. 

Ibiki's summon glued to one of his arm and, keeping his whole body in place, pulled it to a point it almost fell of the junt. 

"Fuck! What's the need of doing that? I am telling —" 

"I am going to ask again. What do you know about Madara Uchiha?" Ibiki leaned, his hands crossed over his back, his face dangerously close even if the man couldn’t see, he could feel the hot breath at his face. 

"I fucking told you already!" the smile was gone. A grimace of pain took its place. "I know shit about him." 

“You seemed to know a lot just two seconds ago.”

“A lot?” a harder push. “Fuck shit. I don’t know shit about him.”

“How do you know about the War?”

“Is there someone that doesn’t?”

Morino straightened his back and knee quicked him at the stomach. The man spit blood. 

His arm was so straight and pulled to the side it made him look like half a puppet.

“Do you like the pain, boy?” Ibiki almost barked at his face. He didn't like when people didn't get scared right away. He hated Pain's summon and, out with the part of being just an empty vessel, that man reminded him of _that_. 

He didn't seem close to break.

Kakashi could see the retort coming _(_ _you’re the one that get off on it)_ and stepped in.

“How do you know about it? How do you know about the war?”

“Everyone knew.” he was panting. “Even the civilians. They took a lot of -” he was having a hard time breathing, sweat falling from his temple and his face was growing pale. “Many, many were killed. They didn’t know who Madara was.”

“Then how did you know the war was against him?”

“People talk.” 

He went silent and it couldn’t be said if it was due the pain or stubbornness. 

“Morino.” Tsunade ordered with a shake of her head. His arm was pulled harder and the skin was ripped. His baw filled the room and seemed to enter their minds like a woodworm. “Unlike you.” She finished with her voice strong.

The man was looking at them, laboured breath and his empty eye balls were producing tears.

“Shinobi.” he said finally. 

Tsunade healed his wound, making it stop the bleeding and at the moment his face was about to contort to relief, she pressed with enough strength to crash his bones.

“Fuck! Fuck woman!”

“Talk.” Ibiki ordered, low and deliberated.

“ _You_ ," he spat, as a course "you shinobi, you talk. Every village you walk in, you leave whispers behind. _(_ _You leave bodies behind)_ I only managed to pull all the pieces together in time to protect them.” 

That was enough of an answer for the day.

"Where have you been in the last ten years?" 

"Around?" he said as in a question, no humour, but with humour still. The string pulled even more. He didn't say anything else. 

"Around?" he was quiet. "Just around?" another pull. Ibiki was growing impatient.

The bone falling out of place was heard among the howl, the guttural sound. If he screamed when Tsunade hurt him that was a whole new level of Dante’s Inferno. Tsunade wasn't smiling anymore. 

"Tell us about." Kakashi's voice came down like a thunderstorm over the place. Yet, over the screams, a storm is always welcome. 

He was screaming over the pain, but it was nothing more than they already knew - been around, alien to the world, small villages, knew things, heard things over the decades. Nothing concrete.

Ibiki looked at them, asking for quiet permission. 

He proceeded. 

The summoned cage was in the process of attaching his whole body to the _golden_ iron chains (not even Kakashi had seen what they do, just the results) when he said:

"An old lady once told me that when a dog bites the worse is" he had to catch his breath before proceeding "the amount of blood than the momentary pain. Did you know that?" He looked at Ibiki. He looked so much like the goddamned fucking doll, all tied up and read to die in pain, but smiling, talking about fucking dogs. "The stitches only hurt later, when they open -" 

(Something flicked in the air. Not outside, not something Kakashi even recognized at the moment. Something flickered out of the man’s body. A body’s flicker under his eyes would got through only the sharingan and then: 

"Fucking changed my mind." Kakashi pushed himself off the wall, his eyes dark. "Tsune, please, leave." 

"Hatake, what are you" 

"Just leave.” 

The summoned cage disappeared leaving the man to fall half to his feet beside the chair. He didn’t had the strength to pull himself up.

Ibiki didn't need an order. 

"Lord Hokage." he bowed as he left. Kakashi's _cut this bullshit_ was said to the closed door. 

“Fix him.”

"You don't talk to me like that, boy!" Tsunade was with her finger pointed so closely to his face it was a surprise she didn’t pulled out his eyes as well. 

“Tsunade, the man is bleeding in the floor and he will get into shock before I can say “suflair”.” Her chest was expanding and her hand was raising and he didn’t know if it was to slap him or lecture him. “Please, Tsune?”

“You take this.” she put a pill down the man’s throat, sitting him up. Kakashi rose a questioning eyebrow at her. “Jesus fuck, don’t you listen to her rambling?” 

“Oh.”

“Hum, would you two mind telling me what she just shoved down my throat? It would be anticlimactic to die poisoned after a week of torture.” the man's voice was raspy, and he was laying on the floor, his mouth full of blood, his whole frame looked so minimal. 

"Oh man." Kakashi pinched the bridge of his nose.

“And, well, be glad she doesn’t ripp your eyes off. It sucks to live without them.”

Even Tsunade’s finger stopped in the air. 

He had to be fucking kidding.

Questions like “How does he know her finger is at his face?” or “Did he hit his head so hard he doesn’t know when to stop joking?” or, the one they kept asking, “Is he really blind?”, but at the stupid joke Kakashi felt the urge to burst into laughter. 

That was it, the joke was funny, he wanted to laugh, but he wasn't allowed to. He nevertheless chuckled a bit to himself and the six eyes drove into him instantly. Tsunade's forehead vein throb and the man just fell into little chuckle himself — six eyes because the last pair of eyes were from Sakura that was perched just out of the window, prepping. A second later she was caught by Morino and almost fell off. Kakashi laughed a little more. No one asked why. The few cons of being the Hokage. 

Still smiling, Kakashi turned to him, and punched him punctual in the face. It was clear as the day that Tsunade wanted to do the same. Her eyes were frantically rushing through the whole room and at every second her face grew redder. She was still searching for something to break or to throw or some shit like that. The woman was fumbling and heat among with chakra was circling her. A fair man would probably back off, but Kakashi didn't give a single removably shit.

"You sound like a teenager. Please, leave and break some things outside." 

She didn't move an inch and the murderous stare was now directed to him. She really looked like a rebellious teenager, with such a young face and temper. He really wasn't up to put with any of this - the interrogation, Tsunade, the war, the way his stomach roared, the smiling man with an already growing slowly bruise at his cheek. He just was fucking thirsty and he wanted nothing but drink himself 'till he choke on his vomit and died. He ran a hand over his face, feeling the weight of being Hokage, being a prodigy ninja, being a drunk, everything. He hold back a sigh. 

"I let you pick the tool I'll use." Kakashi said, defeated. 

It was like offering a candy to a small child in exchange of its goddamn silence — except it was so twisted it was like buying a ticket straight to hell or something like that. 

The woman just gave a sinister grin and even his blood ran cold. She eyed thoughtfully the tools at the floor: a small axe, a sharp little knife, a really big scissor, a thumbscrew, a whip, an electroshock weapon (his favourite. He would always put his own electricity), a instep borer, a tanto, (for fuck's sake) a katana, a boot (used to crash injuries, don't be fooled. One type was made of four pieces of narrow wooden board nailed together. The boards were measured to fit the victim's leg. Once the leg was enclosed, wedges would be hammered between the boards, creating pressure. The pressure would be increased until the victim confessed or lost consciousness. Newer variants have included iron vises—sometimes armed with spikes—that squeezed feet and metal frames employed red-hot), a hammer, a nipper, a saw and a switchblade.

He remembered an article he read ages ago about torture methods some sick preachers would use on heretics. 

_"While the accused heretics were on strappado or the rack, inquisitors often applied other torture devices to their bodies. These included heated metal pincers, thumbscrews, boots, or other devices designed to burn, pinch or otherwise mutilate their hands, feet or bodily orifices (...)_ " 

He was good at torture, just as he was good at everything. He didn't have any hesitation to retrieve information. He often killed the victims after the suffering that made them sell their souls - no use on keeping some one who might speak someday - leaving no trait of his actions. But now he couldn't actually kill him afterwards. He didn't even knew if he would kill him at any time. 

But, right now, he resigned to punch and poke him with sharp objects, hot metal burns, hang him upside down by the hands till it resulted on a dislocated shoulder, boil a soup under the fire underneath his seat, pull all his limbs each way stretching the skin, slit his ankles and ask him to run, cut little fingers, make so much noise he would throw up and pass out, expose him to exaggerated light and then let him meet darkness for what would seem eternity, not letting him sleep, starve him, whip his legs and arms, puncture nails at his hands, poke slowly under his fingernails just for then rip it away, he would rip off the new eyes he had, hit him on the spots that would hurt for days, tie and smash his balls, burn his tongue, rip his teeth; the list went on: blinding with light, bone breaking, branding, castration, water torture, cold cell, combing, crushing, cutting, dehydration, drowning, dry-boarding, dunking, flagellation, foot roasting, foot whipping, hamstringing, hypothermia, impalement, keelhauling, kneecapping, noise , oxygen deprivation, pressure points, sawing, scalping, sensory overload, shinbone crusher, sound (extremely high volumes, dynamic range, low frequency, high pitched noise, intended to interfere with rest, cognition and concentration), strappado (also known as "reverse hanging", stress positions, thumbscrew, waterboarding... 

Without counting the psychological torture - if he had the will to do it today.

But he wouldn't kill him. 

And the best was that he could heal him to perfection and then do it all again. 

Kakashi felt _her_ chakra signature in front of the window that showed the interrogation room — she managed to pass by Ibiki and return to the window. 

Sakura had not only seem, but inflicted a lot of torture methods, some she learnt from watching him. She knew he was looking directly and precisely where she was. She shifted her leg from one leg to another. She wasn't sure what she was waiting to see, but she felt compelled. When Tsunade closed the door, she eyed her skeptically, but her face dropped when she saw the look on Sakura's face: Determination. Anger. Outrage. Chagrin. _Madness_. Displeasure. But the most shocking one was the familiarity her eyes leaked. 

Tsunade knew from that moment that Sakura wasn't not even remotely the girl she once knew.

War changes every one. 

She just didn't expect Sakura to change so much. 

The girl panicked at a genjutsu of her childish crush impelled and, now, she was just staring as she was about to predict his movements. It all departed, vanished when the whole room went black. He had placed a jutsu that wouldn't allow any of them to see or hear what was going on.

Few had the privilege to seal, berate an interrogation room. Even amongst interrogators, even amongst ANBU it was rare. Hell, even amongst the Hokages. 

Sakura was pure ire at this moment. Kakashi could sense it, but he had more pressing matters in hand. The man was their best lead to anywhere as they had nowhere else to go and everyone wanted to take a look at it, but Kakashi just now realised the man would open up to him only. 

And that made perfect sense. 

Kakashi dragged a chair (he caught when he got Tsunade out of the door) into the room and put it directly in front of the interrogated. He lifted his head slowly, his face stoic and his eyes betraying nothing. 

"You know me. _You know me_. You know what I am capable of. You've seen me do it enough times already, but you were never at the end of it.” he put one foot over the seat of a iron chair, leaning both of his arms into his leg, the other one at the floor. He lit another cigarette. “You are today. And I suggest you talk."

The silence stretched until he hit his left hand with an enormous strength with the hammer and the sound of broken bone filled the room. The boy spat blood from trying to bite his on tongue not to scream. Kakashi slapped his face. 

“Don’t fucking do it.” 

The man was breathing hard, blood already dripping from his chin and his hand.

"I can't see why you don't talk. Shit." 

Taking a deep drag, running his hand over his overly messy gray hair, nails meeting the scalp, Kakashi closed his eyes and did his best to copy Kakuzu’s jutsu and turned his hand into something earthy - and hit the man’s side with full strength. The bones cracking filled the room.

Kakashi immediately healed the worst damage - he always did that in interrogations. 

"Why aren't you talking?" 

When the man didn't say anything, barely opened his eyes, he sighed and lifted the hammer again only to smash it at the wood of where his arms were tied. At the shock of not being attacked combined with the pain of actually being attacked, he opened his eyes. What was left of his eyes as all the man had was to hollow balls. 

His sight was a bit terrifying. His hair was long, a beard tickled his chin, his face and visible body were full of nasty scars and he had no eyes. His whole body was covered in blood at one point or another, his face was pointing in strange angles from being badly healed. He was bone and flesh, his skin pale. Children would have nightmares about him forever. 

Kakashi kept taking drags on his cigarette while the eyeless eyed him. With a loud sigh he smashed his cigarette at the man's left hand. He hissed and contorted his face, breath ragged.

"That," Kakashi pointed with his thumb to the door "that, what you said, it was about my father." 

The man just kept breathing and hissing, looking like a caged animal left in the open wild. 

" _Talk._ " 

It was an order. Not an interrogation one, but a fielding one. One you don't disobey. 

Sighing a deep sigh, the man finally spoke, none of the boyish bubbled through him this time.

"They can't hear us." it wasn't a question, it was a statement. Kakashi didn't answer. "Yes. It was about him."

Kakashi stood in silence, shaking his head and taking drags from his cigarette. He had so many questions, about that, about how he knew that, so many things, that he remained silent, locked up in his own head. 

Clearing his throat and them grunting in pain, the man said. "Okay. What do you want to know?" 

"How are you alive?" 

"I wasn't supposed to. I was ready to die, it was my intent.” he stopped, considering his words. “I just ended lying in pain, with a twisted wrist and an ankle, shoulder broken, another one dislocated, just a inch of a broken spine - tough luck - a broken arm, the femur was terribly fucking exposed fracture. There was no point in trying to distinguish broken bones from scratches from what could’ve been burns in other lives. It just hurt like hell. Blood was coating me everywhere and I have never wished death so much. ” it was like he was seeing all of that again, all his body completely unusable, lying waiting for dead. “But death didn't came. A farmer did." he skirmishers on the chair. Kakashi placed his hand above his and he shrunk further in the chair. His hand began to glow green. 

"I am shitty at healing, but I can try enough so it stop hurting so much." he muttered below his breath, his voice as detached as ever while he was trying to piece everything together, but nothing made sense still. "Go on." 

"The farmer took me to his house and rolled me up on bandages. He wanted to take me to an hospital, but I didn't let him. I told him I wanted to die and, well, I couldn't see it, but I am pretty sure he looked exasperated. He just shoved me further in the bed and said he was still bringing wood to the house and he would be back in a few hours. Before he left he gave me water and I drank like a golden fish that got back to the ocean." he chuckled humorless and shook his head a bit. "I didn't want to die. I _had_ to." after swallowing hard, he dropped his head and Kakashi was sure he would be leaning his arms to his knees if he could, so he untied the man after finishing poorly fixing his other hand. 

"Do you smoke?" was blurted abruptly. 

"Well, not really. And I am almost sure you didn't as well, taic-" 

"I didn't, but I do now." That being said he shoved the cigarette onto the man's mouth and lit it. He didn't complain and didn't choke. Sure as hell he had smoked before, but who didn't? At some point in the life everyone smokes, even if just a drag. The human curiosity was something else. And, if not by curiosity, someone always shoved down their throat a cigarette just for 'Give it a try'. 

That was how he smoked for the first time. He was eleven and an older guy in a mission just tucked the cigarette to his mouth and he cuffed all the way long. He only smoked again two years later, the day Obito died. The day Obito died changed absolutely every aspect of his life. Was the first time he got drunk too, despite his small frame walking into the bar. Probably bar owner's don't give a shit about how old you are, as long as you pay. Which wasn't the case as the boy shunshied away. So he made the man smoke and smoke he did. Even people that didn't smoke took long, blissful drags, the nicotine always calm them down and that was what was needed. To calm down. Calm down and feel some sense of faux protection. Calm down and pretend he felt at home. Calm down and stop his shaking hands as he was sure the story of the farmer didn't end well. 

“He left a bottle of water.” was spurred out as the way the smoking question did. “A few hours later, I guess, I was a bit relieved from the pain, so I guess he put something on my glass. If it was poison, I didn't care at all, but it was _just_ painkillers. Even though just painkillers developed to something much bigger. Something I never would’ve seen.” 

Kakashi's eye darted to the window he knew Sakura was behind. The blind man obviously didn't see it, but he sensed his abrupt movement. He was still in a pretty good shape to someone without eyes. 

“Know someone that went through the same drug problem?” his question was met with silence, as the interrogator was interrogated with a simple question, he stiffed. Kakashi forced his heart to beat into a ordinary rhythm. There was no way he knew, he could’ve known. 

The man kept talking as if he didn’t notice he said something that turned the tables.

“His wife came home less than half a hour than her husband. I heard their whispers in what I assumed was the kitchen, but couldn't make out what they were saying, but only in that moment I realised their accent was odd. Apparently, I was carried long away from the village and was at a civilian one. In a moment she popped at my side and placed her hand at my forehead. _Burning,_ was what she said and after that I passed out from the pain as she set the first bone back to its place. I must have been really drugged as I just woke up several hours later. Then the healing process began. It took three months before I could even walk again. Not having chakra healing is shit. Even as I sensed little waves of my own chakra, it didn't really help that much. Only after two more months I could begin training again. As I was alive, I might as well be useful. I didn't know if I should head back, but it was my original plan, but then, god knows how long after, I heard about the massacre. And I threw up. And again and again. The thought that Itachi slaughtered the whole clan made my hair's in the back of my neck stiff. It wasn't like him, he was the most pacifist person I've ever known. You know that too." it wasn't an accusation, but it sure felt like one. ' _I can't believe you believed he was a cold blooded murderer when you should've known better_ ' was what was left unsaid. "Anyway, unlike you, I knew about the coup, so it all clicked in place. And I felt like an utter piece of shit. I was a coward. I could've stayed and fought, but I decided it was better to run away. To chicken out and let someone bare alone such a responsibility." 

"You shouldn't be ashamed of that." 

"Being a coward?" the bitter note wasn’t missed by a beat.

"Sacrificing." when the man sneered, Kakashi blew a full mouth smoke into his face which made him cough. Kakashi smiled deviously. "Don't be a martyr and don't be dramatic. It doesn't suit you." 

They smoked in silence for some time, the only sound their own breaths and heartbeats. All around was quiet. He flared his chakra to let them know it was alright and they didn't need to worry. Not that they were worried, the two women. They were probably just pure ire. 

"I know about it." 

The man said in a soft voice, his not-eyes turned to the floor, something akin affection in his voice. Kakashi head snapped at his direction, his eyes widening and he's never been so happy for one's blindness.

“About -” Kakashi’s voice was barely a whisper, it could be taken as a mountain claiming the morning sun. You can’t hear unless you are paying attention. He uttered so low, hopping the topic would die. 

Did he know about Sakura? If he did, all he said until know was utter and pure bullshit. He was nothing but a traitor. There was no salvation here. There was nothing for him here.

"I know about the two of you. I've always had." Kakashi decided in that moment that he preferred when he was being judged than being _pitied._

Because that’s what it was: pity. And it wasn’t about Sakura. 

It was worse. It was about a ghost. A ghost that laid untouched for so, so long.

So he said "Hum." 

"I couldn't not know.” the man went on, the small smile forming in his lips. The tiniest of it, the blood still at his tongue. “I was his best friend, after all." he lifted his head and _looked_ at Kakashi.

"Sasuke is dead." 

The change of subject could be interpreted as him running from the primer matter, but it wasn't. He just felt he needed to voice it. 

"So I've heard. But I got to say I thought it was just a rumor. And... did he really killed Itachi?"

Kakashi nodded before even realise he was talking to a blind man. Again. He really wasn't used to blind people at all. He was used at people's stare, mostly the stare of those who died by his hand. 

"I see." no, you don't, his mind filled in and he almost felt bad for the poor joke. Almost. "Ta—"

"Don't." he was cut harshly. "Don't call me that." 

"Why not? You were my captain, after all." 

Silence. 

"You think you don't deserve it? The respect?" 

Silence. 

"Why?" 

He asked again and again silence it was. 

"Is it because of him?" 

Silence. 

"She doesn't know about it, does she?" Shit, what? How did the kid even knew about her. He was staring intently at his direction with such a scrutinizing way he wondered, not for the first time, if the man was really blind. "I am really blind" fucking mind reader as well? "And I don't read minds. I'm just used to it. Without sight, I had to learn to handle myself.” 

"Why you didn't want to speak?" 

"Would you, Kakashi? Be honest with me? If you vanished and was declared dead for over a decade would you be happy to open up to people that easily?" 

He deflected. 

"We're not just people, we're comrades." The words sounded empty even to him. 

"No. You aren't. You are strangers. You can take me as traitor any second and send me to death." 

There was a clock ticking in the wall and for the first time Kakashi noticed that. Probably the clock alone was torture. He stood there in silence just staring at the man, wondering what he should do. He was not a traitor, but he had over a decade to come back and didn't. 

"Why?" 

It was all he said. He didn't elaborate. Didn't press or ask further. Just why. Just understand and answer why. 

"Because." 

Fucking great. 

He sighed. Kakashi took from his pocket a small bottle he always carries with him. 

"Do you drink?" 

The man tilted his head as if giving it a thought for the first time ever. "I guess." He shrugged. 

Kakashi took a big gulp and passed it to him that hissed. 

"Strong shit." Kakashi fulfilled before he spoke. The man smiled. 

"Everyone says that?" 

"I said that the first time I drank it." 

"It's not sake. Is it vodka?" 

A silver eyebrow raised so high it disappeared over his hairline. 

"How do you —" 

"I traveled East. I didn't settled down as a farmer raising goats. I've been everywhere. That's why i didn't return." 

"Why did you take all this time to say it to me? Tsunade could've killed you. She wanted to. She was willing to, even." 

Again, he shrugged. 

"How do I know if I can trust you?" 

"Kid, I'm the Hokage." 

The man laughed and he sounded the same as he did when he was sixteen. 

"You do sound the same as you did all those years ago, taichou." 

"Don't call me that." Kakashi said in a heartbeat, always that harsh voice at his given titles. 

"Lord Hokage is better?" 

He just rolled his eyes and offered the bottle again. 

"So." 

"So." 

Kakashi rolled the chair in front of him and sat on it, his usual slouch even if all of his senses were completely tuned. 

"Ready to talk, Shisui?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> PLOT TWIST  
> Yeah, I brought Shisui back because why not? I love him, I think he should've been so much more appreciated and he will be. Period. There are so many characters that were put aside and they had so much potential and Shisui is an example.  
> I am fucking in ecstatic with the response (yeah, 8 kudos, 1 comment and 2 bookmarks to me is way too much, I am in Heaven) and I am feeling so happy because my life turned into shit since the quarantine and noe I have purpose.  
> I know things make little sense, but they will make and come on, what's the fun on understanding everything in a heartbeat? Hehe.  
> Well, wash your hands, leave kuddos, gimme reviews, don't go outside, take care of your mental health and I wasnt going to say this, but apart from sounding a psychopath with torture scenes I havr borderline disorder, depression, panic syndrome, etc, so if you are in a bad shape this last few days, we can chit chat. I have like 3000 memes to share.  
> I talked way too much. Sorry.


	3. White Lies

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Do you kill War?
> 
> Or it simply kills you and keeps on killing until there is nothing left but sand?
> 
> Gaara would live through sand.
> 
> Would he? 
> 
> Nothing is immortal. Truly immortal. _Nothing._ The Universe needs balance and that’s why the Sage of the Six Paths created Tailed Beasts, to balance the power. That’s why they were scattered around the shinobi world – to maintain the balance.
> 
> Nothing is immortal, nothing lasts forever. 
> 
> And with Madara has to be the same. 
> 
> “Is this the power of a God?” Gaara said. _Yes,_  
>  but Georg Hengel also spoke about the great pain of knowing that God is dead.  
>  “Nature is such that it marks everywhere, both in and outside of man, a lost God, purely as a phase, but also as no more than just a phase, of the highest idea.” 
> 
> Max Stirner wrote about the death of God and about the killing of God by humans,
> 
> I've read it once.

* * *

_October 3030, the begging of the 4th Great Ninja War_

* * *

> I was born with **glass bones** and **paper skin**. every morning I break my legs, and every afternoon I break my arms. at night, I **lie awake in agony** until my heart attacks put me to sleep.

* * *

NARUTO DIDN'T KNOW THE order things happened anymore. He didn’t know ever since his father appeared, his cloak ruffling in the air, the kanji showing whom he was, his blond hair and his presence so reconforting he wished he could just hug him. But he couldn’t. He was a leader now, just like his father once was. And, now, he would die for the sake of his people, just like his father did.

He wondered what crossed his father’s mind the day he died. If he considered flee, all those years ago, Kurama destroying it all — if he considered just for once second. Looked at his wife (his _mother_ ) and no matter how much Kushina, his mother, _his mother_ , might protest, clamor, struggle, yell — just look into her eyes, their huge purple eyes, he go to see it, just once and say “Run.” and that’s that. Run. Naruto wish he said that. He could see that Kakashi-sensei thought about it a lot when he went to visit their graves. Everytime it was like he was like he was closing his eyes and coming back in time, grabbing them by the collar, shaking some good sense onto them and saying “Run!”. But Kakashi wasn't there and his parents were dead.

_(Naruto wondered what Kakashi would say to his father if he could. He never could even fathom. What would you - what can you say? How do you ask your father not to kill himself? Naruto used to cry when he thought of that._

_Kakashi’s chakra was steady as always, not shaking in fear. He was there, leading them all, his life lying at his feet, but his chest taking the fire to protect those behind him. Naruto would never live up to come eye to eye to this man._

_Maybe that what he could say to Kakashi’s father, he ever got the chance.)_

The air was biting and the huge whitish stone monster was there, showing them how pathetically small they were. He was scared of the fucking huge Bijudama, Menacing Ball, Tailed Beast Bomb — you choose. So many names and just one purpose: dilacered. They built all the walls they could think of, all the strategy. But they would die. The giant purple thing he used to see with Kurama, he used to train with, he used to fear, but that, that was much more _menacing_ and the killing intent was in the hair in his body, every single capillary, dominating all his cells and all his mind could think of was “How am I going to save them? I made a _promise_. I never go back on my word.” But never going back on his word could be forgiven if he died, right? But if they all died there, two questions rose:

Who would be left to take them home?

Who would Madara feed dreams to then?

Then, he felt his father and his heart felt relief. He could feel the prayers around him, his comrades swallowing and everything wondering how would they survive, if they would and how would they fight afterwards. A line opened in the horizont and the ball vanished and he was never so happy to see what a thunderstorm meddled with all the natural catastrophes encapsulated in purple coming in one at their direction. If you put the world into a blender and shove it thunderstorms, hurricanes making peace and love with volcanos, tsunamis, cyclones, floods, landslides, hurricanes, typhoons, forest fire, meteor falls, storms of ice, hail and lightning then you would have a Bijudama. And _that_ his father made vanish.

But the _Fourth Hokage_ arrived — and he never wished so badly his father (his _father,_ not the Fourth Hokage) never died. He wished to see his mother’s hair, red, vibrant, screaming just as loud as the Blast. He knew his mother would scare it all away. He never wished with all his might his parents were alive. They would brush his hair, they would hug him and thank the Heavens he was alive. His mother would scold him for not being too careful and being on the front lines, would like to meet his friends and would all but Chakra Chain everyone. His father would look at her lovely and put a hand at her waist. She would choke at the sight of Obito and probably she would be the one that would succeed to beat him down. 

The Red-Hot Habanero would come in all covered in her red hair and hold his hand. The Yellow Flash of the Leaf would put his hand in his shoulder. In the middle of the scrubs they would find each others eyes and their personality would leak, there, in the battlefield, smiling, smirking, grinning to one another and he would know he belonged, he existed. He wasn’t just the monster, the Number One Hyperactive, Knucklehead Ninja, Naruto, idiot, dobe, good for nothing. He belonged. 

But that was for him to dream of if he survived. Maybe he could steal a smile from his father in the middle of the madness. _(Maybe he could surrender to the Infinite Tsukuyomi. Save them all and let if wrap himself. Would that really be selfish when you think about it? Try to have a decent life?)_

He barely began and he was already tired of fighting. Already tired of having the burden of the whole Shinobi World — the same World that despised him through his entire life.

Don’t mistaken Naruto for ungrateful. He was finally being recognized. That was his dream. But he wasn’t stupid, as everyone took him for. He was naïve, at the very best. He could feel he was being used and he was afraid like hell to be disposable. And, the worst part was, his father would be gone as soon as the War was over.

The only time Naruto Uzumaki saw his parents was when the World was about to end and he was about to die. He didn’t had the time to memorize their features.

Things happened in a blur. Naruto didn’t know the order the things happened no more. His father lost both arms, but he gave him it back. He wondered if with his new power he could see his mother again. 

_(He knew he couldn’t)_

There was fire everywhere. It was all _Fire._ Be the Will of it or the fucking Uchiha. Everyone was dropping dead and who was to blame? The mad man? That Kaguya fairytale the Sage told him? Mankind?

The insane pursuit for power?

Do you kill War?

Or it simply kills you and keeps on killing until there is nothing left but sand?

Gaara would live through sand.

Would he? Or that was just another escape route so Naruto would feel better for pretending that not every single person would die in his hands like Neji did? And Neji was the one that died in his arms literally. How many others were dying and were about to die?

They kept on fighting. All of them. They were still fighting Obito, Madara and the Ten Tails – that fucking thing doesn’t die, for Heaven’s sake. It is like the most powerful thing ever, but it really should die. Right? Nothing is immortal. Truly immortal. _Nothing_. Not truly immortal. The Universe needs balance and that’s why the Sage of the Six Paths created the Tailed Beasts, to balance the power. That’s why they were scattered around the shinobi world – to maintain the balance.

Nothing is immortal, nothing lasts forever. 

And with Madara has to be the same. 

“Is this the power of a God?” Gaara said. _Yes,_ but Georg Hengel also spoke about the great pain of knowing that God is dead. _“Nature is such that it marks everywhere, both in and outside of man, a lost God, purely as a phase, but also as no more than just a phase, of the highest idea.”_ Max Stirner wrote about the death of God and about the killing of God by humans.

I've read it once. 

So, yes, Gaara. It is the power of a God. 

And he is going down — eventually

Yet, there it was: Madara yelling and yelling about dancing, and the Infinity Deceit, the Red Moon made of an enormous Sharingan, _dancing, fucking dancing_ (like to watch me dance, go to my ballet performance) and God, please, couldn’t it just stop? What does it bring to Madara? Why he wants that? To have the peaceful shinobi world he wanted from the beginning? This wasn’t _peace_! Nobody told him that?

“Oi! You!” Madara didn’t hear. Jesus. “Creep, annoying, don’t know when to shut it, you!” He was yelling some annoying shit the other direction. 

Naruto had to scream from the top of his lungs. The battlefield was so loud he couldn’t barely make his own words.

“ _Y_ _ou, old coconut!”_ He heard this time. “Didn’t anyone tell you that casting a genjutsu over the entire world isn’t the same thing as " _peace_?" It is just decisiveness. You’re being stupid!”

It isn’t Naruto’s regular approach. He convinced bad guys talking about ramen and stuff, sad pass and swings, but he was told Madara wasn’t that kind of guy, but trying wouldn’t hurt. Right?

“You’re just fucking dumb, kid.” Was his polite and thoughtful answer followed by the biggest fire dragon Naruto ever saw. He decided approaching Madara wasn’t a good idea.

“I told you, you can’t win him with talk no jutsu.” Kakashi said, smirking, his chest was open, but wasn't profusely bleeding anymore. 

“Fuck off, would ya?”

His sensei just smiled more, his eye creasing further and Naruto wondered if the man had fallen into madness or if facing death so close was enough to loosen him and rip a true smile from what seemed like a painful motion. 

He looked around and Sakura was scolding Kakashi at the same time she was healing what seemed to be an open fracture in his leg and he was still smiling. Maybe he was high. But seeing everything from where he was brought the world from a new perspective.

Naruto was standing in a pile of rocks that gave him a better access to the battlefield, he could see almost everyone. He didn’t have the time to dwell or admire how beautiful the scattered innocence, untidy faces, traces of tears, spatter of blood can make the bat of eyelids sound magnificent and how alive you can feel with the gush of wind; live is only precious because it ends — you realise one day. If often does when you’re about to lose it. 

He truly didn’t know how they managed to stay alive for that long, because the man was a God and he was immortal. Naruto had his amount of immortals as well, but Madara was a level up. And Obito was fucking crazy, fucking delusional and everytime it seemed they finally got him they didn’t. He tried as hard as he could not to look who else was dying. If he saw, if he acknowledged he would break and he couldn’t break there, not now, not ever — not in front of them, not when they _entire shinobi world_ was counting on him.

Now he understood Kakashi, but sideways. He always said he was too old for that shit, but Naruto felt too young.

“Hey!” his closest clone yelled. “Kakashi-sensei!” his teacher spared him a glance and he was so covered in blood and he looked like a veteran, like an expertise, like power and fury — like a legend. Like a broken mas that needs to kill his best friend. He looked like his father, the ghost of the White Fang pouring over them, even if Naruto never saw the man, he knew that, he just knew. So he decided to tell him nothing. “Thank you.” Was his only statement and also covered in blood he smiled to his mentor whose eyes crinkled with a real smile and no words were needed no more. 

Naruto didn’t say anything because when Kakashi was his age he had already lost everything he had and he had so many ANBU mission over his belt than Naruto had been punched by Sakura and said “believe it!”.

And, then, Neji died.

In the middle of his disconsolateness, something happening and Kurama’s chakra _died_. He wasn’t glowing orange anymore. No one was. (He wanted to be worried, worried sick, but he couldn't)

In a moment, it was Neji’s body over his, telling him he sacrificed himself from being called a genius. He saved him saved Hinata — that had had sacrificed herself (“ _I_ _love you” he remembered her saying in the day Pain almost killed her — but he hugged Sakura instead)._ The next moment he convinced Obito, all white, gray and green, after Black Zetsu tried to eat him, to come to their side, that Rin wouldn’t ever love that version of him. It wasn’t Obito, that was Tobi and Tobi was no one – neither Obito nor Madara. Tob was Tobi. (Tobi wasn’t real, Obito) The next moment the Sage of the Six Paths shared Indra and Ashura story — how Madara and Hashirama were _born_ to fight, how him and Sasuke were _meant_ were born, were made, were _meant_ to fight. From the moment of their birth to the moment of their death, their faith was to fight and put an end to it, either for the Good or for the Bad. He started glowing, the six black balls around him, fluing, Sasuke had the Rinnegan, Kakashi-sensei almost lost an eye (again) and when Sakura put her hands to try to help him, fix him, something, he came and gave him a new eye. Just like that. Because now he could, he _can_.

He was now some sort of God.

The fight was no longer for the mortals.

Yet, it didn’t stop Madara.

All his generation knew about war was what they read in books, learnt in the Academy or heard by the fire eating canned food. And reading about something and living it is two completely different dimensions.

Everywhere he looked at there were screams, there was blood. Water, fire, wind, lightening, earth. It was all collapsing and all in fusion. It was all part of one another, it was impossible to distinguish.

It was Madara against the World, but that was enough. It was scary how much one man alone could hold so much power.

The former wars were between shinobi. It was man against man. Eye for eye. It was fair, almost. There were some freakishly strong against standard man, but it was _fair_. This, this thing, right now, was anything but fair.

The fight went on and on and on. It lasted for days. Days and days and days. 

At one point, the flower blossom. Some were caught the second it opened. Yamato was one of those. He just got released from White Zetsu and he barely blinked. C followed him, among with Suigetsu — for what they could tell. They kept fighting to find ways to stay in the shadows, small caves, bury themselves in ground, mud walls, everything. 

By the day, they fought back, with all they had. Everyday more fellows fell. The caves where being blasted, exploded, the rocks they had at their back were shattered so they were losing the shadows it would cast during the night, the holes they entered and closed with wood and vices were bombed. 

So, those who managed to survive the day, died at night. Madara was especially cruel to destroy their shells and havens preferentially at night, when they were hiding. 

Sasuke would appear here and there. He wasn't the savior when things got really ugly and it seemed there was no escape — when those moments came, they themselves managed. Sasuke was there like a visitor, like he was there just because he had nothing better to do — like his fucking _rinnegan_ had nothing better to do, like it wouldn’t basically _save_ them. He would show up out of the blue, help, because he was as much as a God as Naruto and puff, vanish in the air. Trying to hold onto him was like trying to catch smoke with your hands. 

After a particularly nasty night where Sakura lost her wits on her anger because of him, as soon as the moon began to sat, she left the cave they were in and sent a rock bigger than a tree in the direction of Madara that was caught in surprise — and, for the first time, in a long, long time, he spat blood and lost his breath. Sakura didn’t waste time celebrating. She sent what was supposed to be a tree and it didn’t hit him fully, but he still got hit. He planted his feet in a rock, crouching, trying to access where it was all coming from, once they barely took the offensive anymore and she punched the ground in uttermost strength, the ground exploded, just like it did at the bells test, a nature force

_(She would never know, but Kakashi was smiling)_

and sent a good 5 km range open. It all trembled as if an earthquake hit them straight in the gut. Madara had his eyes wild, staring at the disheveled pink girl, her eyes, even at the distanced, glowed and, for a moment, he calculated that a punch from her would be worst then from The Beast. It crashed all the soil all the way to where he was seated and further. The place looked like a desert, all the vegetation gone and now it looked like the backwoods. 

Madara fought back, but something was odd, was beginning to feel odd. Or all they were too used to his fighting style or they were going freakishly strong out of nowhere or Madara was having a bad day or Sakura hit him too hard, but he wasn’t _that_ overpowerful. 

See, the man was a monster. He was a fucking God and just being is his presence ma de the air cold, and people were dropping day after day after day. The tree was huge. Bigger than anything they ever saw. And everyone was there. 

It was just them. 

They had the former Hokages by their side, (but all the living Kages fell, leaving only Tsunade), Naruto and Sasuke overpowered, Kakashi-sensei, overpowered Obito, Sakura and her Strength of a Hundred Seal, but they were facing the wrath of a God. An immortal God.

Everyone else has fallen already.

It was just them against Madara. It might seem easy. Ten against one, but the bastard refused to die. If was fucking annoying. Every time they managed to hit him, he raised to his feet.

"Something is wrong with this fucker." Tsunade said in between her breaths. Her pigtails wew a long lost fantasy and she still had her stomach uncovered.

The Hokage looked older. Not just as older as she was, not like the henge fell, but older as in tired, as in almost _scared_. Tsunade was never scared (She was, Naruto, she was). She was though. She was _scary_ , not scared. Naruto wondered what actually happened to them when he had to leave the five of them to fight Madara.

_(Later on he found out she was strong enough to make a Susanoo'o crack, but he put five of those to each of them. He found out too that she used all her med-nin power to heal them all while she was pretty much cut in half. Looking like that, the woman seemed immortal. She wasn't.)_

"I know." Was all Tobirama said, his Hitai-ate nowhere to be seen, his shoulders absent of anything but a flak jacket that was ready to fall. His deep voice was deeper and his eyes were harder and angrier than Naruto thought it was possible. He was reincarnated, so he looked scary enough anyway. But, black orbs apart, it seemed that his gaze alone would be enough to tear all pieces off Madara apart.

"What do you mean?" Sakura yelled from where she was. Her face was so dirt her eyes seemed to jump off — she wasn't scared, though. Naruto didn’t know if that was good or no. Kakashi used to have that expression.

Madara chose a new fight instance. He divided between two limbo and four kinds Susanoo'o that wasn't all that tall and imponent. The crazy bastard was yelling crazy shit they all were tired to listen to — that shit he kept saying about dance and shit. Dance in hell, you fucker. But he only divided in two limbo clones and the small versions of blue annoying thing.

Which was odd enough in itself. His Susanoo’o, the shit he was so proud about was _smaller_. It was almost half of its normal size and it wasn’t so fast – but it was fast enough, though.

It was odd indeed.

For a man that released twenty five Susanoo'o and was playing with six limbo clones using just this was weird as fuck.

Even his voice seemed odd. Naruto shrugged it off, at first, thinking that maybe it was because he spent _an entire month_ yelling, but his lungs didn’t seem to be giving him all the oxygen he needed. 

"He is weak." Minato said, his cape didn’t have neither sleeves and was ripped in diverse places. "Before, he was fighting like a madman, using everything, throwing things with his infinite chakra. Now, it almost seems like he is holding up."

"Why would he do tha—"

Naruto's phrase was cut when the Susanoo (smaller, but annoying) almost crushed him with his still big ass sword.

They divided themselves in teams that kept in rotation so the man couldn't read and interpreted their pattern of fight. It was risk, but it was their best shot. You need to get familiar with each others fight style, that’s what teams are for, but they were good, they were fucking tremendous – and even though Naruto, Sakura and Sasuke (when he gave 'em the grave of his presence) weren’t elite shinobi (yet) they were doing a fucking great job, thank you very much.

The real Madara was using a distance fighting style, using fire style jutsu more than approaching. He had a huge arsenal, but they had a copy nin — every time the man decided to throw a new jutsu at them, Kakashi assessed his mental arsenal and counterattacked. He hadn't the same strength, but it was fun enough to see Madara burn with rage to see someone a thousand years younger using his own jutsus back at him.

Their fighting style was settled as a defensive one, jumping from here to there and attacking once in a while, more in the goal to distract than cause damage.

The limbo clones were the real issue. But Minato managed to mark them with seals and share it with every single one of them, so every strike of the clones in their direction was a millisecond dodgeable — they almost lost their arms, heads, stomach, lives, but they were doing fine.

Naruto just couldn’t wrap his mind on why that was happening. On how it was all happening. For a whole month all he did was _survive._ He barely fought back. Kakashi-sensei was in a limbo between using some of his Mangekyou power’s without the eye itself (the man adapts), but he didn’t have the Sharingan anymore. Sakura was monstrous and he didn’t have to say anything about the Hokages. And Sasuke. 

Fucking Sasuke Uchiha. 

All his brother was, he could tell Sasuke would never be. He barely knew Itachi Uchiha, but he could tell the man would never flee even less when he had power enough to help them to _win_. Yet, his foolish little brother wasn’t consumed only on vengeance. He was fucking selfless. People were _dying_ , because no, they weren’t just getting caught in the genjutsu. Every now and then, Madara would kill someone just for the sake of it. 

The battles in daylight were always the worse. They didn’t have to hide and to fight with eyes closed, but Madara could see them and seeing them he could do as he pleased. They were running out _everything_. The summons were having a hard time on bringing supplies. It wasn’t like they had soldiers to send home and bring them supplies. No. They had to deal with what they had. And that meant losing several pounds. 

They moved the battlefield the best they could. They began retrieting, trying not to show. It was a silent agreed, but they decided to retreat to the Leaf. Of fucking course Madara noticed, but he didn’t care. You could run and run and no matter how far, the moon would catch you. Yet, he wouldn’t let anyone rest. 

He kept attacking, they kept defending, they kept trying to survive. All and any kind of summon was to be sent to the Leaf, do its best to seal food and medical supplies and drop them. The amount of soldier pills they had to consume would probably leave permanent damage to their gastrointestinal system, but who gives a ratsass. The amount of _pills_ they had to consume would probably leave permanent damage — just as so many other things they had to use. 

Naruto anger grew everyday, just as hunger grew in everyone’s bellies and just as much the tree seemed to grow with any new person it held captive. 

Every new comrade taken was another drop of hatred in the Uzumaki cup of hatred — and it was about to spill.

Everyone was using their abilities, but they wouldn't last that long.

As if reading everyone's mind, Kakashi said. "We can handle this just for a while longer.” He was panting. Him, Obito and Sasuke were the ones that fell on the celebration of Madara’s hit the bull's-eye. “There is indeed something wrong with him. He is fighting from distance and his clones aren't powerful enough —" His trail of thought was brutally interrupted when the Susanoo'o foot hit Tsunade straight in her gut and sent her flying for 70 meters at least, hitting a big rock that almost fell all over her.

Kakashi's soul made a double twist and bile rose to his mouth, but he thought fast ( _a genius)_ and sent a big ass shuriken embed with a purple fire and lightning in the direction of the rock making it explode. His mind was spiralling in the fact that if Tsunade was crushed that would be no Madara with Hashirama cells to save her. He wished, once again, it was him.

Despite blowing the rock small pieces hit her and an annoyingly still big one hit her in her head and she fell to the ground like a heavy potato sack, completely still. Her black adornment vanished from her skin and that, that meant one thing.

( _Why, oh fuck, oh why things only mean_ one thing _, one fucking bad thing when it happens? Why it couldn’t just mean something like hitting rocks offend the ink so it leaves? Why the absence of chakra means that the people is dead? Why things ever mean one thing? Why is ever the worst thing? Why is always_

_death)_

The Strength of a Hundred Seal only vanished when the owner decides to or when it is forced out of them. Naruto's stomach tightened.

Sakura's scream filled the air and it was they could hear for what seemed miles and miles away and the time seemed to froze. 

Until she ignored the limbo clone to run in the direction of her shishou, she received a hit straight in her face, that probably broke her chin and she fell to the floor as well, like a heavy potato sack, but she was still conscious. She spit blood and her face glowed green within seconds and she was again in her feet. When she reached again to run, Kakashi held her by her waist and threw both of them to the ground, building an earth wall moving his hands so fast it wasn't possible to follow with the eyes just in time to hide them from a fireball the size of the rock Tsunade hitted.

In one heartbeat Naruto tucked Tsunade over his shoulder and formed, again, what seemed to be a thousand shadow clones. The real Naruto took Tsunade out of the frontline. His Kurama chakra returned to him and all his clones formed different shaped and colored Rasengan and sent them in the direction of all the threats — the real Madara included.

The moment his strongest clone touched the real man, the moon glowed a pale red and he was gone in a puff of smoke.

“Nice dreams, kid. I am sorry about your Hokage. Quite waspish, she was. Pretty, but death comes to you all.”

With that, Madara kicked the bucket and Naruto was torn into rage and grief — he couldn’t tell which was screaming louder and it was deafening. 

It was the end, he thought. It was the end because Tsunade died and he didn’t know how they would escape the genjutsu again. It was night, they couldn’t hide like they did for the past month. All their hiding spots, all their plans were gone already. That was it.

The end.

Naruto braced himself, not knowing what to do, grief and anger eating him — but, for once, Sasuke wasn’t so selfish and his Susasoo’o appeared out of nowhere and took them all under its wing, shielding them. Sasuke wasn’t nowhere to be seen during the whole fight, over all this last days, but now he showed up. And Naruto wanted to punch him just as much as he wanted to thank him — but mostly punch him.

“You fucker!” Tobirama was pointing a finger at him, a blue energy raising from his fingers and Sasuke faltered. It was Tobirama and it wasn’t surprising that he was scolding an Uchiha, but the boy was two thousand years younger and Naruto couldn’t care the slightest.

“Tobirama…” Hashirama put a hand in his brother’s shoulder, that was glowing blue, his chakra so strong that filled the space of the Susanoo’o wing. The elder brother seemed to be walking in the direction of the Uchiha, but was forced to halt, in shock. “Don’t yell at a kid.”

“A kid? A _kid_ , Hashirama? By his age everyone here had seen _wars_ and fought them already. He is just an —”

“Inconsequent brat.” Kakashi voiced. 

They all were killers, assassins. There was no reason to deny it. Maybe, for the first time since Sasuke decided to go rebel angst avenger he felt the weight of his true actions. He didn’t have any escape route here. There was no Madara, no Zetsu, Orochimaru, distractions. He was caged. He was caged and Kakashi barked at him, a hungry wolf, drool at his chin and no one wanted to stop him.

Naruto’s head was spinning and no matter how much he seemed to enjoy people finally telling Sasuke that he was a spoiled little petty sucker, he _broke_.

He broke in a way no one ever predicted.

“Why the fuck Madara is even so fucking obsessed with this Infinite Tsukuyomi?”

Even after controlling Kurama’s chakra, now Naruto wasn’t burning that ugly orange that made him look like a toy that shines neon light in the dark. The neon light made him look more like a candle, a spinning toy, an amusement park. No. Naruto was Pain, right now. Skeleton bones and red noise. He was pure what he was when he didn’t have control — he seemed like a beast, an animal, a treat.

It was pure red rage in the air, so strong it hit them as if they stuck their heads in an oven and let it burn them. The ground shook with the impact and the first thing that came to mind was to treat him in a way to take him out of this anger and put him anywhere else. (It didn’t fucking work, I spoiler it to you.)

“Hey, boy, watch your language around your father.” Tobirama said, that dark tone of his, his arms forever crossed in front of him, but he was now only in a black shirt with shreds of his armour still clung to him, all his uniform was half disintegrated.

“Yes, Naruto, please,” Minato began, his voice soft, but strong. “This isn’t how – this isn’t – isn’t how –” his voiced dropped and in the screams it was barely audible.

“How you raised him?” a snarled mocked laugh left Sasuke’s lips, the closest thing of a smile playing in the corners. “That you wanted to say, Namikaze, uh?” contemptuous, insolent. “You didn’t fucking raised him at all. You died before you could clean the drool from his chin.”

“Fuck you.” Kakashi’s voice was low, so low it sounded pure bass, fuck the baritone, he could touch the ground (only 5% has bass voice) and could raise dust and gold and sand and swallow Sasuke. He turned to him and in that moment the killer all of them never actually truly saw — they were _beside_ him in the battlefield, not standing there and appreciating, the murderer in his eyes, the metalic taste of blood danced on the tongue of them all — shined in his direction and it appeared as everyone hold their breath and took a minimal step back. This wasn’t a sensei and his student. This was the legend and the traitor.

_(He wouldn’t ever know, but there were two pair of eyes sat on Sasuke with the same intensity, but Kakashi had his burden in that moment. He couldn’t spare glances, his eyes were daggers filling the floor with Sasuke blood. He wasn’t alone though. Blue and green were with him. Sasuke lost them longer than he thought.)_

“And yeah, Kakashi, you would know that. Wasn’t like your father was there to raise you either.” Sasuke said again, but the mockery wasn’t so loud. Kakashi might not have his sharingan, but his eyes turned red.

“Hey, you don’t have to throw him into this. It isn’t him that make it happen to you.” was it Obito? Obito defended Kakashi – to save Sasuke’s skin (no) or to spare Kakashi’s pain? 

(“Throw it at me, it seemed that Obito was saying. Throw it all at me. I helped to slaughter your clan, kid. I might’ve not killed your parents, but I did helped to give the street a nice red wash.”)

Either way, it just made Naruto turn to him, anger boiling.

“Obito, oh, yeah, I should throw this at you. _Yo_ _u_ were the one that killed my father. You were the reason he died.”

“Naruto, you should control your anger. Throwing it at everyone –” Kakashi tried. Kakashi, the pacifist — at heart, because in action he kills more than breathes. Why Kakashi still tries? Why doesn’t he rips Sasuke’s throat?

“I am not throwing it at everyone, I am throwing it at you! You” did he point to Sasuke or to Kakashi? Why is he mad at Kakashi? “and this fucking psycho.” he pointed to Obito, almost closing the space between them and shoving a finger in his chest that would break his rib cage. “Why the fuck is he still here?”

“Why the fuck are you still upset with this?” Sasuke, bitter. Sasuke never understands.

“Why the fuck are _you_ still here?” Naruto bit back at Sasuke, red, orange and blue, the air cutting deep like a kunai.

“Naruto, calm down. This is not the time to be freaking about whomever is — this is exactly what he wants, what Madara —” this time, it was Hashirama, pacifist. No wood, just a fireplace in the summer. Useless.

“This is not what he wants!” Red is scary, Naruto. “What he wants is to control the fucking world! And we don’t even know why he is so obsessed with this. I can even understand Obito, ya’ know.” he turned to the man, mocking him. No one knew Naruto could be cruel, but he could and a lot. He just never, ever showed. He knew how much it hurted, but he wanted to hurt now. Really, really badly. “He couldn’t even stand the girl he loved didn’t love him back. She loved someone better than him and Obito was a parasite.” his gaze fixed in Obito again, his eyes red. “You needed Madara to tell you what to do ‘cause you couldn’t even think, uh?”

“That’s the brightest conclusion that brain of yours managed, Naruto?” Obito was falling apart, white, green, black, no heart, no future. Just a fine Rin-line and Kakashi’s pardon. Minato would hug him too and that made Naruto skeleton grow even further and his red vibrating form just broiled them. 

“Is that what you think, kiddo? That’s what I wanted? You think that I was so self-centered, so stupid? That’s what you’re telling me?”

“Yes! That’s what I want — that I am telling you! I want to fucking spit in your face, fucking Uchiha. You killed my mother, you killed my father, you fucking destroyed all for me, for Kakashi, you made a monster out of me, people hated me, I had to live with this.” tears, so hot, streaming down, but evaporating in the anger rolling out of his skin. “Now I have to _kill_ people, I have to kill because of you, I have to kill a bastard that came out alive, came back from the dead just to fucking absorb mortal people and get — get a fucking entire tree? Just to put everyone to dream so he can — what the fuck does he even want with this?”

“I don’t —” Obito, confuse, defeat.

“Oh, no. No, no, excuse me, I’m sorry. No, no, no! You don’t know it, you don’t know anything about this. He never told you! He kept like — like training you, for what, Kakashi-sensei!” Naruto waved his arms to catch Kakashi attention “how long it was that Obito died?” he didn’t wait for an answer “Oh, yeah, something like _eighteen years_ , with this twisted fantasy, fucking around and messing with people’s heads and he didn’t ever tell you why he wanna come up with —”

“Naruto, calm down!” Kakashi ordered, didn’t plead.

“I won’t cal— ”

“Stop!” Sakura, all pink, all red, all black, fused in blood and tiredness, her sensei at her feet, a thousand strengths worth in her skin.

“You weren’t there!!” Naruto yelled at Kakashi, accusing him, finally, not knowing whom was who, whom to blame, who abandoned him and his parents, his life.

“It was not his fault.” Minato tried again, his own anger there. Kakashi never saw him angry before.

“Oh, oh-ho!” Naruto half shouted, half laughed it off with no humour at all. He was fucking losing it.

“Shut up!” Sasuke, all black and purple, in the deity of his red and black spirals, interrupted the discussion not about him because he couldn’t stand being in the shadows.

“You shut the fuck up!” Sakura, all pink and anger.

“Show some respect.” Sa-su-ke, slippery, thinking he still owned her, tried. _Show me some respect, Sakura._

Kakashi threw a kunai with explosive tags at him, one he barely dodged, oh so arrogant he was. His eyes, purple and red, widened, like he was betrayed even if he was the traitor to them all. His black hair framed his face like a framework of a medieval painting lost in time: beautiful, trying too hard to be terrifying, but the time ate it out. His sword was in his hand and Kakashi’s tanto shined white in the air — White Fang, Chio yelled while he tried to explain himself, his chest probably aching as much as Naruto’s did all the times he thought about his father. He didn’t know Kakashi used his tanto again. Obito moved too, wounded nevertheless his spinning wheels eye was alive and angry. If a fight took place there it wouldn’t be friendly.

“ _Stop this!"_ a thunderstorm yelled.

Tobirama Senju was a quiet man, but right there, only two words, only a finger raised and Sasuke remembered his grandeur back when he brought the four back.

His figure was surrounded by blue and power. The Third Hokage shrunk — the man was his sensei once. Not even Hashirama moved this time. Now they weren’t the Hokage’s disputing. No. It was the older and wiser of them. Tobirama was the older brother, the sensei, the Second Hokage. _He_ was someone worth bowing to.

Through his blind hatred for the Uchiha many took him for just obsessed and forgot his raw power — but in that moment only two words was all it took for all to shut. Still, he looked at Naruto less than a minute later giving him his blessing — _clean your soul, kid_ it said. Naruto deserved it, after all.

“Drop this, Naruto. Please.” Sakura turned her eyes, that no longer looked all that green and naïve — she didn’t look like the girl he once loved. Green tea looked too much like honey bums now. She looked too much like Tsunade like that, bearing too much in her shoulders, him himself included, trying to save him, stop him.

“Stop it, Sakura.” Naruto couldn’t bear being saved by them.

“Naruto —” neither being pitied by Kakashi.

“Shut the fuck —” he turned to his sensei, hot tears in eyes again and they were as red as the sharingan that drowned them to this mess.

“Naruto! Enough! Show him some fucking respect! He was your sensei and —”

“And? Why should I show some respect, dad? He wasn’t there.” his voice was hoarse, but the fight wouldn’t die soon.

_(there_

_\ ˈt͟her \ is an adverb. learn to pronounce: in the UK is /ðeər/ in the US is /ðer/ and who the fuck cares._

_"there" to Naruto meant the day his parents died. Where, maybe, someone could've done something. Not just them; not just his mom and dad. There is no way to know if that would've changed something. It would forever be a butterfly flapping its wings. But Naruto couldn't stand the idea that no one was there, because, if someone was indeed there, the only thing they did was watch his parents die. And that was unforgivable.)_

“He was there.” this time it was Hiruzen who spoke, his voice so raucous as if he forgot how to speak even before his death.

“Who the fuck are you to tell this, God of Shinobi? _You_ weren’t there.”

“He was there.” Kakashi insisted on that, but there was venom in his voice. The way charcoal looked down the whole gray man made Naruto shiver — Kakashi was a man of strict following rules and that included the respect, but his eyes showed he despised the former Hokage. For some reason if comforted Naruto.

“He wasn’t there.” Naruto denied, talking about Hiruzen. His voice was shaky.

Being confronted with the fact that people just watched his parents die was as painful as looking at Obito in the eye.

“He was there.” his father confirmed.

Naruto mouthed “ _no_ ”, perplexed and angry. How many times can one person fail you and stand in front of you as if nothing happened, without apologizing? He didn’t know whom he should ask first, but his eyes flew to Sasuke.

“He was there, then. Good. And did precisely what he did through my whole life: nothing.”

Sometimes the silence is deafening.

Hiruzen lowered his head and prayed for losing his tongue, biting it out and bleeding his entire past. He was to blame for so much of that. He knew from the beginning and never did anything. He could feel his sensei’s eyes all over him, but he couldn’t face him. Tobirama’s disappointment tears your worse than a thousand daggers and suffocates you to a point of no return until you can no longer separate what once was your dignity from the reproach you turned into.

Danzo once suffered from it.

He didn’t do nothing then either.

Naruto didn’t have to know that.

He mouthed again, “no”. A person can’t disappoint you that much and not blast into dust.

_(Sasuke was still standing, wasn’t he? But the Third Hokage would disappear into dust as soon as the jutsu broke so technically he built a roster of delusion in Naruto’s chest herein so many others. People sometimes turn to clay, powder and you just don’t see. [Sometimes, too, what the eyes don’t see, the heart doesn’t feel. At least, that’s what his heart hold onto despairingly)_

“He wasn’t there.” Naruto accused again.

Silence. So the anger boiled, like soup to the sniffing nose in the winter.

“He came in with troops to watch your death and that’s it?” once again, Tobirama was blue and Hiruzen was nothing but a hole in space — a hole Naruto went to punch. He turned to Kakashi instead.

“You were there.”

It was a charge.

The silence meant guilty.

This time, Naruto punched him. 

“Naruto, don’t!” Minato began to run to his side, but Kakashi already hit the wall/Susanoo’o and taking deep breaths, cleaning the blood from his mouth, only lifted his hand laying on his side trying to get up. He didn’t refuse Obito’s hand when he offered nor Sakura’s glowing hand.

“I didn’t do anything neither.” Kakashi said, resigned. As always; as always, carrying the blame for all that happens in the world.

“Stop it.” it was Sakura to hiss.

It is incredible how easily a woman can be forgotten, even when she was healing a comrade just seconds ago.

All eyes turned to her.

She was no longer a liability.

“Drop it, Kashi. Just fucking stop it. Stop this pity party.”

The world slowed its pace around them, her eyes hard, mad and his eyes between defiance and assuming it. It didn’t have to be spoken to be understandable.

It was like the bottom of a giant puzzle finally trying to fit, finally trying to show an image and that small, tiny shit seemed to bright. For Minato, Obito and Naruto seeing someone that was always held so fragile to be so hard and settled, with enough resolve to put Kakashi to at least think to _s_ _top_ would be lifting a burden.

But Tsunade was still at their feet and Tsunade was the one that healed Kakashi from Itachi’s Tsukuyomi and Kakashi and Sakura understood that, no words needed, when they looked at his eyes. One burden half one, a huge one new.

And then

“What the fuck is going on here?” for once, Sasuke asked something worth listening.

 _(What the fuck is going on here? Here was too much happening all at once. All the conflicts were meeting tere. Naruto with his father, Naruto with Obito, with Kakashi, with the Hokages, with his whole life. Sakura with Sasuke, Sasuke with Naruto, Kakashi and Sakura. Sakura and Naruto. Hiruzen and Tobirama. Tobirama over everyone. Kakashi and Obito. Fights for power, over fairness, friendship, arrogance, loss, everything was meeting_ here _and_ here _was a fucking terrible place to have this discussion.)_

“Shut the fuck up, Sasuke!” Sakura pointed a finger at him, her eyes so wild he recoiled but stepped in front again.

“I ain’t even talking to you —”

“Drop dead.” was all Kakashi said and turned his back to him. Honestly, even if the line sounded like teenager-esque, it wasn’t the time to bicker with him like a twelve year old. Sasuke looked so much like Madara when Hashirama arrived at the field and didn’t have time to play warfare with him.

Sasuke is a fucking crybaby and everyone is sick of it.

Sasuke would never see Sakura as an person, leave it alone as an opponent, so she took it in her favour and feasted in her favourite genjutsu — a particularly nasty one. See it as a payment for all the times he tried to end her life and then just turned her back as if she was dust.

In six quick hand signs, Sakura turned to him in one swift motion he didn’t notice because he _never_ notice her and never would think of her as a menace. He dropped at the floor — caught in a genjutsu. If it was the proper time, Kakashi would have smiled.

Tsunade was pale, Kakashi was broken, his father dead.

“ _You!"_ Naruto pointed again at Obito, hissing like the snake Orochimaru is.

“Enough, Naruto.” Kakashi sensei’s voice dripped all around and truth was that Naruto looked just like in his first day: yellow, orange, loud and dying to prove his worth, wanting nothing more than help, _s_ _ave_ , but he was lost. That Naruto long ago was lost and so was this one.

“No! Not enough. No fucking enough. You were there, Kakashi-sensei. You were there and you did nothing!”

Caught in surprise, this time Obito was the one to take a blow. He flit some meters and came to a halt, sand in his eyes, his knees scraped, the punches Kakashi threw at his stomach still hurt. The punches he threw because he didn’t want to kill him.

That boy with the red eyes and tails trying to find someone to blame sounded too much like himself. He sounded too much like sunken in blood as he was the night he found Rin. When everything went off.

 _(Naruto wasn’t one to lose his nerve. Tobirama wasn’t one to intervene in fights, Hiruzen wasn’t one to shrink, Minato wasn’t to get angry, Kakashi wasn’t to threaten, Sasuke wasn’t to let be put on menace over a kunai, Sakura wasn’t to impose herself – not against Sasuke, Hashirama wasn’t to let Tobirama’s temper win._ _The only think in place was Obito now. When Naruto offended him, he defended himself. When he was yelled at, he yelled back. When Naruto hurt him, he_

_bled._

_Naruto was already losing his shit over his responsibility for the dead ones. If he kept like that, he wouldn’t survive. Obito always wondered how Kakashi made it that far. He wondered, more than often than he liked to admit, how he could make survival of a raw, awful thing be so_

_beautiful.)_

“It wasn’t that simple —” Hopeless swam in Minato’s eyes.

“Fuck it. He was there and he did jack shit —”

That seemed to be the eternal motif: the hangman.

Not one, but all that caused his parents death. Therefore, the ones that, even with his new powers, still stole him the chance to see his mother and his sensei. Thus, the ones that stole him all he always envied. Yet, he did not see what was right in front of his eyes: one of the headsman was one of the hanged and he was poking him with sticks made of flame. (And Kakashi was letting him, as he always does. _Stop this pity party,_ was what she said. Maybe, someday he will be able to.)

The first Hokage cut the air like a blade cutting through crunched leaf: easily but too loud.

“Madara’s still here?”

There was an urge in his words that was lost to only Naruto and his father. The air went full with static and small, teeny rays ran from the ground to the skin (which should be impossible, once the earth doesn’t convey lightening. This was no ordinary shit.) making uncomfortable goosebumps raise.

“Did you, First God of Shinobi?” what the fuck is he even talking about, Hashirama thought.

“Stop talking to people like that, Naruto!” Minato hissed, but that didn’t matter anymore.

“WHY SHOULD I?” As his voice sounded like a thunderstorm it couldn’t be comparable to his brother’s — Naruto’s was made of nature’s energy, like the Earth itself was giving him some piece of its power to roar, to make the ground tremble.

At the same time there was another thunderstorm, just as potent. Only Naruto didn’t notice, but his covered the whole sound outside his bubble. His eyes appeared to never have been blue at all and would never be again. His hair was wild and couldn’t be tamed, like Kakashi’s, but he didn’t cary that safe sensation like that. No. He just looked like the dangerous whisper he was as a kid.

_(As a second thought, for a fly of second, it occurred to Sakura that Kakashi also was once a dangerous whisper. When she looked at his profile her chest was filled with peace and safety, like a harbor. Being with him was like being in security of home, of a port and yet she knew that ships weren’t made to that. And even with that being recognized she knew very well he could be a powder keg or barrel beer and sail with hair. Just as a dangerous whisper.)_

The air outside, the impending danger went quiet.

That was a mistake.

“This is not you at all…” Sakura was pleading. She hated to plead.

“Shut up, you — you — all. Shut up, shut up!”

“Naruto, stop! You are not this kind of person.”

“Why not?” a twelve year old boy. “Why not, why not, why not?” lost, tied, without lunch, his eternal rival and his crush by his side. “I’ve been Naruto,”the kunai tucked in his hand, a promise made in blood. “the good,” calling Sasuke a scary cat, holding a giant snake at his back, smiling not for revenge but for relief. “smiling boy all the time.” mastering the Rasengan, at the cost of almost killing Sakura. “Why do I have to keep like that when people are dying?” saving Sakura from Sasuke’s hands. “When they are continuing to die?” being saved by Sakura’s hands. 

“Naruto, stop! This isn’t you.”

To Kakashi, every word of Naruto’s was splintered with imagery — pure torture inside his own head.

“This isn’t a fairytale, Sakura, this isn’t like fighting in the Academy to train.”

His mother, a face he didn’t really remembered. But the howls of his father over her bed were as loud as the screams of birth and death.

“This is real life.”

The first time he killed. It was a man. He was three. He didn’t mean to, it was an accident. His father told him they should bury the body, but there was no time. Another enemy appeared and Kakashi gained his first scar. But the true terror was his father’s blood covering his eyes and fogging his sight.

“This is fucking more.”

How cold and stiff his father’s body felt at his feet. He had just come back from Academy, after a short mission. It was supposed to take three days, but with him it only took half. Kakashi made dinner and called for his father. The soup was completely cold when Minato found him.

“People will die.”

He was pretty sure he lost his eyesight, but when he saw Obito’s eyes in a red turmoil he felt no pain and just relief. He finally came in therms with the boy he known for all this years. They didn’t need to speak to know they recognized themselves as what they were denying all along – best friends. They’ve been in so many situations already and camaraderie grows you like it or not. So when the rock remove the light of his body and the eye of his life, he felt like a blade through his torso, cutting him in two.

“They will and will and will continue to die — and, and their — all — theirs — there is their blood in my hands”

Rin. Rin, Rin, Rin. She haunted him for so long. He lost the count of the nightmares. He decided that going into a work that dealt with no feelings at all was the best and only thing left for him. He would not only never forgive himself, but never forget. The feeling, the sickening feeling. He was way too young to know that feeling way too well. Her body, her blood, her bones, her eyes, her last word, his _name_ never let sleep. The pills and the alcohol helped, but time never heals, it just replaces memories — but some never leave.

“and even worse this is your hands and you’re continue not to talk about this.”

Minato. Kushina. Small Naruto in the middle. He couldn’t see, but he knew Minato summoned the Shinigami. His sensei was sacrificing himself for the better good. For his child, his wife, his village. Kakashi never hated the land he was born so much as that day. He saw the long claw of the fox through the chest of the only family he came to know, to see the life leaving their eyes, see them talking to their son for the first and last time in their lives. He could never talk to the boy. There were days he sat in a tree near to the kid’s apartment and would repeat what they said, as if he could hear it. Everytime that yellow hair walked around the streets his heart clenched and his sensei was all he saw. His death. The splash of yellow, red and orange. For once, the Yellow Flash of the Leaf was not fast enough to save the love of his life and his son. He jumped in front of the claw, but they both died together.

_(Kakashi wished that if he ever come to love anyone that he had to die with them or it would kill him slowly. Be it a fang in his heart, but to find what he love and let it kill him slowly — but never before him.)_

“All of this is bullshit and I am tired to talk and to talk and to talk just to see if I can put some fucking sense in their minds.”

Itachi and the massacre. Itachi and his thirteen years, his ANBU mask over his head and a smile in his face. Itachi and the smile he wished he could touch under the white porcelain that day in the treetops after they tricked Shisui’s crow. Itachi and the hair ruffle he gave the boy to soothe him from the world he so pretended to not be afraid of Itachi.

Looking at Sasuke the only resemblance he could see was the hair and the pointy, elegant, womanly pale face. But not only a cell held any similarity. Itachi was the man Sasuke wouldn’t even be able to dream of reaching.

“I am tired to be the one that has to do everything.” Naruto finished.

As he stopped speaking the whole electricity came back in a jolt, throwing them out of their feet.

“Fuck.” Kakashi inveighed as Tsunade’s unconscious body fly to a open space and was about to hit a massive rock that would finish killing her, if she wasn’t already dead. Tobirama was faster (because he truly was) and caught her midair.

He turned to them smiling. Sakura was on fire, ready to burn him for smiling over her dead shishou but then she smiled on her own and none of them ever saw such a big smile on her face.

“She is alive.” she nothing but whispered, turning her face to look at Naruto and Kakashi, tears in her eyes and that huge smile. They were smiling back, relief washing their faces, their hearts back on their usual rhythm.

And then Madara simply fucking vanished.

(Three seconds later, so did Sasuke.)


	4. Of Civil Wars and Poison

_October 3032, 3 years after the beginning of the 4th Great Ninja War_

* * *

cope 

kōp/

_verb_

gerund or present participle: **coping**

(of a person) deal effectively with something difficult.

"his ability to **cope with** stress"

_similiar: manage; survive; subsist;_

_(psychology)_ the process of managing taxing circumstances, expending effort to solve personal and interpersonal problems, and seeking to master, minimize, reduce or tolerate stress or conflict

* * *

" _You see,_ " Shikamaru said from where he stand looking down at Hidan "you and I believe in different things. You wanna know what I believe in? The Will of Fire." Hidan had his mouth open and his eyes wide. "Right now, the only god you should be worried about isn't your stupid Jashin, because I'm the one who's about to pass judgement." He had the last kunai with the paper bomb attached to it. 

"You fool!" the mad man yelled from the scrubs. "Don't say I didn't warn you! The day of retribution will come, and the way of Jashin will punish you! And then I'll be the one passing judgement!" His entire chin was soaked in blood and one of his feet was propped at his right side. "My teeth! That's all I'll need! You'll see!" the intensity of his glare burned. "And I'll tear you to pieces."

Shikamaru fled the lighter open and finished the job. 

_Now, there was no maniac laugh. Just the bothered ground and the deers._

* * *

Right now, there was the sound of bombs and yelling, people howling in pain and other shouting insults. The place was a mess. 

What once was built up mountains, resumed to be just a few tiny rocks swallowed in mud. The few trees that rested in the place, dead branches looking more like claws were set on fire. Only one tree was still standing, poorly, until the ground was shaken and waves of water clashed against each other, provoking a small cyclone that turned into blazed fire that roared so high it set half of the tree on fire and dusted the water off. The tree was millennial and just as it was ready to burn to the ground, becoming a dead piece of history, killed by man and for the man to kill, just as everything around them, a snake of water turned it all into a huge cloud of dark. 

The ninjas kept jumping from branch to branch, from surface to surface, unleashing their elements until facing their eminent deaths. They knew it. From the moment they put their feet out in the battlefield, they knew all they were doing was dance with death, for as long as you can.

There is a thing about war. If you look from up above, far, far away, up in the clouds, as if you are an angel or a god, you won't be able to distinguish who's whom. They are only black spots attacking each other. There is no right or wrong. No good nor bad. Just fighting. You don't know who's your side, who's your enemy. Is like watching ants carrying leaves in middle of a hurricane — as you don't give a fuck about the ants, it is hard to know who is the target you are supposed to give a fuck about. It's just war and war is just death. Lots of blood, lots of life. Innocent people always die. _Always_. It is unfair with them. They had nothing to do with any of this mess and yet they are ever the first to perish.

When you don't know which side is yours, you can't celebrate nor be worried. You can only watch, observe. Calculate — and that's what Shikamaru was doing. 

He managed to stay in the tree and he managed to make the dark cloud his ally of a great source of shadows. He thought he would burn to death or he'd drown, but in the end it all came to dust and fire and water rose up and blinded him, just to leave him in the branches smelling like the charcoal barbecue Choji so loved.

He was up above watching the battle field. It was a mess of fire, water, wind, earth and big ass lightening. There was smoke everywhere, where the fire fought against the water, window fed the fire, earth lost to lighting. Most of the time, they didn't have the time to say which jutsu they were using to attack. It was just hand signals and pray for your life.

Kakashi was an easy spot and, yet, hard to follow. The man moved in a blur. It looked impossible to be that fast, yet he was. Minato was placed in another battlefield, leader of the _3rd Company_ , and Tobirama in another one, leader of the _5th Company._ They never placed the three companies in the same fight, unless it was a massive attack — as it had been. To put the three fastest ninjas in one combat, the enemy had to be a fucked up tough one. 

Lately, at least they have been out of these. But not for long, and they knew.

The field Minato was, was still at full potential, showing no signs of flattening. His men were suffering big losses and the strategies changed almost at daily basis. They sent Shisui and Bee with him, but they were still unsure if Bee would turn against them, so it was proving to be a bad, bad decision. Their fight here, with Kakashi as leader of the _2nd Company,_ needed to end within two days to sent some of theirs to support. 

Tobirama's front was holding well enough and had to keep it that way. He was the one holding the gates at this point. Hinata and Hiashi were crucial there to lead the Bird and Gateau Squad, respectively, and sooner than later they would have to ship Tsunade back. 

_(No one ever thought the head of the Hyuga clan would be back in the field. Much less under his daughter's orders. Even less that Hinata would be one of the best ANBU captain and that her eyes still shone when she smiled, despite the dry blood on her chin. Her father seemed mesmerized every time she took a killing blow or barked an order at his direction, mask in or out, when the conditions were bad. Hinata's hair was past her hips now and she wore it like a crown, now known as the Princess of the Demon Eagle, even though her hands turned into lions. She turned to be the best sensor in history, able to see for over 20km. She also wore the title like a crown, her cheeks nowadays only having time to blush when she was taking her mask out to break or when she was opening her eyes in front of Sakura. She still stuttered something, though — but her voice never came out shaking.)_

Their own fort was built to resist for two months, which was their plan to stay there so the rotation of squads should've began already, but the battles turned to be much worse than they thought. Every day was one less day for them to built the proper defense and one more to add to their theory that _they_ were back.

Kakashi and Shikamaru were the ones that planned the attack and defense boards, that dealt with strategy for this front. But they couldn't sit back and watch, see if their plans were working. Their minds had to be at its best, because you never can predict the other's instability. You can be a hundred percent sure an enemy will act in a _x_ way and when it comes to the battle, they go for a _y_ you never thought about. So you have to plan it all again. 

That's war: playing in full time. And you cannot take your time to rest. Your _mind_ can't take its time to rest. 

Shikamaru was at the top of the tree, trying to cover as much ground as possible. InoShikaCho broke apart a few hours ago. The enemy wasn't dumb and found a way to separate them. He found Choji already, who was at this precise moment crushing five men between his huge hands and stepping in another god knows how much with his right foot, but he wouldn't last more than one hour at best. He couldn't find Ino. Still, he kept on dancing in the shadows. Just at this tree he was able to kill almost thirty man. It casted a big shadow that was only about to grow, but _he needed Ino._

Then a puff of smoke showed at his right side. He barely had the time to look from the corner of his eye and raise an eyebrow. The men right in front of him, seven of them, fell to their feet. Death by shadow strangulation complete.

"Found the girl." Pakkun said with his bored voice and ugly face. Shikamaru was about to ask just _how_ he knew he needed to find Ino, but the dog raised a paw and shut him. "Kakashi knew."

And that just explained everything. Of course Kakashi knew. The man sees it all. He rivaled Shikamaru in terms of geniuses. 

"Where?"

"Five o'clock. Does your shadow can catch her in this range?"

"I can't see her."

The pug sighed and it never ceased to surprise any of them how much the dog looked and sounded like an human. 

"I will catch her."

And he disappeared. Shikamaru trapped more enemies and crushed them. The faster, the better. The army seemed infinite, but not his chakra.

This war is going to last years, he and Kakashi knew. Everybody knew, probably, but it was better to think it'd end soon enough for them to return home to eat turkey for Thanksgiving. But it was January 21st and there were no turkey for them. 

As soon as Ino entered his eyesight, he had to stop himself from gag. Her right arm was utterly smashed and half of her head had been scalped. Sakura was right behind her, making the last arrangements just for her to be able to perform the jutsu. Once the medic let go, Ino fell to her feet, a big ass dog by her side. He knew Ino just looked worse than she felt, otherwise Sakura wouldn't let her stay in the field — not for long. But Ino states and then, they worked as one. 

He stopped, Ino possessed, Choji smashed. They kept it for hours. As the moon rose, he knew he was of poor use, so he retrieved. 

In long wars, no one can stand fight non stop for days and days. It is like going on patrol. Some rest while others take care. And it goes on and people die and new arrive and more die. There was no time for proper burials. They had to burn the dead. It was heartless, but they didn't had how or the time. 

It was a clean death and a dirty destiny. No one deserves to be set on fire. Much less alive, even though it's been happening more and more. 

_(Although, it has always been. It seems war just puts things in a new light. When you train in the academy or see Itachi training in one go his Fireball jutsu, all it looks like to you is how to make someone jump to a tree or to be impressed by the hole it makes on the ground. But no. Fire jutsu aren't just to make the enemy jump out of the way. They melt to the floor and the smell of human skin burnt sticks in your nose and in the depths of your brain forever, to whisper behind your ears at night.)_

The day Shikamaru's stomach turned was when Ohnoki used his particle dismantling to annihilate enemies in the same go the get rid of the corpses. In one strike, he ended comrades and enemies and there was no time to be shocked. 

_(Except Shikamaru saw Ino vomit and Naruto's mouth fall open. It isn't that big of a deal, but it was. It was like run a sword through your comrade chest to reach the enemy's one._

_It was fucked up, but everything at that place was.)_

When he entered the HQ, he had to lean against the wall in order to stand on his feet. His legs shaked and his heady felt dizzy. _Chakra depletion,_ he knew. But at these days, everyone suffered from it the whole time. Sakura produced new soldier pills that tasted worse than cow's shit, but kept them alive. Thanks God they had the best medic at their side and not against them.

But there was no God to thank when he looked at her face. She was pale and yet her cheeks were rosy as if she just get burn. Kakashi was planted by her side, his hand by her hip and if he wasn't so tired, he might've even raise a brow at this.

But there was no God to thank when he looked at her face. She was pale and yet her cheeks were rosy as if she just get burn. Kakashi was planted by her side, his hand by her hip and if he wasn't so tired, he might've even raise a brow at this. There was no room for gossip. There was no room for gossip in their lives. The truth is, ever since they were seventeen and the War stuck on them like a glue, like a bubblegum that refuses to leave your shoe, like the piece of chicken stuck on your throat ready to choke you to your death there was no room for mundane things. What if Sakura slept with Hinata or if Ino slept with that nameless girl before his house explode or if Shikamaru himself slept with Temari and let her cry on his shoulder every time afterwards just as she let him cry and curse sometimes? What if, what if, what if? Sakura loved sleeping in Naruto's lap and only when your 12 and immature you laugh about it. When they still had a home, half of Konoha moved in to the Hyuga compound as it fit them all and they need the vicious tongues loved to say they were the kings and queen of orgy — every.goddamn.night. Probably, not even Naruto has this much stamina. 

And after awhile it became normal. Just normal. If Sakura slept with Kakashi he wouldn't be a pedophile because she wasn't 16 anymore and she didn't give a fuck about his title of sensei/professor ever since 13 when she joined. Ino could sleep with Genma if she wanted to. Boi, fuck, he looks asexual and too pure for this world but people could fuck _Yamato_ or _Iruka_ . And the funniest and _most important_ fact: saying this doesn't mean they do.

It just means that when you can die or see your friends, the ones you love the most in the Earth _die_ by your arms or in your arms, gossip and taboo are shit.

But in his mind when he took in the thin line her mouth was and how old Kakashi looked. The man didn't look a day past 20, but right now, all his years weighed him down, just like it used to happen with Tsunade when her henge would drop. His mouth felt suddenly dry and no amount of water would take the sour taste away.

Sakura was leaning in a pillar, in a human body, before she shattered face on the floor because just as Kakashi, she _couldn't._

Shit happened. 

Shit has been happening, as per they were lost in two theories: the Akatsuki was back or a fake Akatsuki was back. 

When Madara vanished for the second time, he had the courtesy of un-sealing every single member of the affiliation, as far as they knew by now. They didn't meet all of them, not even when the Allied Forces ended the Fourth War — or what should have been the end. 

The attacks didn't stop. The war didn't stop.

It was small, just random attacks, that grew. It started from the bottom and now, we're here. And now, no one knows the truth anymore — except that they saw Sasori and Sasori was the reason to their fort. 

Yet, they didn't get a nice look at Sasori, a pat in the back, sit here, my friend, let's drink some, _let me look in your eyes._

There was no fucking way to know if he was reanimated or if he was back. Even worse: there was no way to know for sure he was _the_ Sasori.

That's what the fort is about.

It could be a copycat, though. Many reanimations literally exploded when the war ended, so it was plausible if those were borrowed, homemade cloaks of a bunch of thugs relying on the moment to make their move. 

The whole thing was troublesome and most of nights were spent awake, trying to make sense off of this mess. They were all broken, barely functional shinobi in the battlefield and that was growing too dangerous. 

Someone, something was back or was new, it doesn't matter, the result is the same: there are fights going on and off, retreat, attack, withdrawn, advance, recoil, charge in. This battle has been going for over three weeks, twenty two days, a goddamn month it would be, non stop, the longest they faced yet. The past five conflicts never passed fifteen days, but now they were at full force and they were attacking a particularly difficult spot to allies to reach (and it seemed everyday some weren't trying any more, but they didn't had the time or the strength to dwell on that at the moment), so it was basically the Leaf getting kicked in the ass and fucked mercilessly. 

Sasuke, as the good traitor he was, wasn't by their side — but also as the dramatic angst teenager, he wasn't their enemy. He just was somewhere hunting peace of spirit or god knows what. The fucker could have at least the decency of showing up, but then again it was Sasuke. The last they knew about him, he was dead. At this rate, they couldn't find the energy to care — as well for the fact, he turned out to be alive twice.

_(There is this story about the boy that cries wolf. The tale concerns a shepherd boy who repeatedly tricks nearby villagers into thinking a wolf is attacking his town's flock. When a wolf actually does appear and the boy again calls for help, the villagers believe that it is another false alarm and the sheep are eaten by the wolf. Is what John Hookman and Louis Untermeyer's said, I've read once. The moral stated at the Greek version is "this shows how liars are rewarded: even if they tell the truth, no one believes them", it echoes by Diogenes Laërtius._

_Sasuke's life and death were the wolf and the tale itself. They couldn't spare time to care about him anymore — not even Naruto at now. Sasuke was a bridge to be crossed as they got there. Maybe they'll find only bones at the meeting point, but then again, Sasuke is his own wolf and they can't save him from himself. He chose his path.)_

"The fight is dying. I'd give only a few more hours." Sakura told Shikamaru as she walked away, in the direction of the private conference room. She was barefoot. 

"What are the numbers?"

"They're outnumbered now, by four to one. But they aren't retreating fast enough, which makes me concerned."

"Are we fighting empty shells again?" His voice was tired and he almost burned his finger when lighting the cigarette. Kakashi took one for himself without asking and said with the fag between his lips, his voice muffled. 

"That's what we are concerned of." He gave back Shikamaru's lighter (he didn't notice the man draw it from him) with a loud _click_ of the metal closing. 

The Hokage opened the door to the conference room and in the blinding light he could see just how whacked Kakashi actually was. His hair was its usual mayhem, but some were even more disheveled, some locks really dark shades of black, red, dark grey, crimson red. His left eye scar was like fresh, like some tried to rip his eye out of his face again, along with a nasty deep cut in his cheek, that began in the line of his eyebrow and ended near his chin, his hitai-ate was gone, his clothes were torn and blood soaked its way through all of his entire uniform and the was a gaze drenched in red. His left arm was still in raw flesh with Sakura's glowing hand healing it while they walked. Both of his hands had just remains of his gloves, the palms burned due the Raikiri, purple lightening, only god knows.

Sakura was all fucked up as well. The tiny scar in the tip of her right eyebrow now had a twin much bigger; not bigger as Kakashi's, but it ripped from three quarters down her forehead and ended at the side of her eye — if it was a bit more to the left, she would have lost it. As it was, her face was soaked in dry blood, slashed in different directions as she clearly sipped her face many times and it was smeared with dirt too. Her pants were torn, almost her whole left leg trouser was ripped off — he assumed she used it to make Ino's tourniquet — showing a skin full of scars and new healing battle wounds. There was a huge gap in her right leg, a hole that spread over all her inner thigh. It was an ugly shade of purple as if it was a big bruise, but Shikamaru knew better: if she wasn't as skill medic as she was, she would've lost that leg. Probably, someone hit her with enough strength to almost burn a hole through it.

Sakura's jounin uniform had seen better days, as it didn't exist anymore. All she had left was a dark shirt, ripped here and there, but with her left side to the middle of her back completely ripped, her skin was still pink, but the healing process was still visible. Sakura had been skinned. 

Unlike Ino, Sakura and Kakashi always felt worse than they looked. Temari once caught Kakashi stitching his shoulder hidden behind a tree in the middle of the battle because it was "just a scratch" and he "couldn't waste time with such silly things". When she forcefully took a look at it, he had nearly romped a tendon and was shrugging it off. But that was regular Kakashi. He's been this way ever since he learnt to walk and would be until his burial, but for Sakura, no one saw it coming.

Being a medic, it was her duty and a sense of responsibility to heal herself properly to then heal the others. Except that she threw this rule into the trash and forgot it forever. Her wounds were always the worse and she was the last on the line for her own recovery. Usually, Sakura just healed herself enough to keep good to battle and don't collapse while taking care of others. She never stayed behind, too. It was an _order_ for the medic nin stay behind to heal, but Sakura was always in the front lines and no one would ever take her from there. 

Kakashi had still arm around her as they walked through the door to the conference room, the light shining yellow from atop, his hands, even unconsciously, it seemed he wasn't making pressure in her new forming skin. She was fucked up. Everyone was.

They'd seen better days.

"We have new Intel." 

Kakashi said as they reach the table, popping his feet up, crossing his ankles in it and his chair was sustained by only one leg. Looking at him like that he didn't look like the Hokage or a living legend or known by his brutal murders. 

"How do we know it isn't a lie?" Shikamaru's voice was so dragged it could be a slug.

"Well, Kakashi took care of it." 

Nothing else had to be said. Ibiki was still the god of torture, but _ten_ years in ANBU changes people. Forever. 

_(It was somehow important to people don't know how good Sakura was at interrogation. She learnt it all from Kakashi, all his quirks, all his methods, every thing she could put her hands on. Yet, people didn't know. It was important for the balance of the world that Sakura still remained as a hot headed. It saved them more than once when the enemy fell at her hand and thought they would mess with her with a few words here and there and, mostly, when they took her for helpless._

_There will always be remarked the day she made a guy split his guts and the truth with a branch and then proceeded to impale his partner as a way of warning. It was a no one's land, where they were. It was the time they still had Sai and Yamato. It was one of the times no one knew where to look, but at her. It was one of those moments they forgot she had pink hair and soft breasts. It was at times like this that she remembered that Kakashi's hair was soft as a plume as his voice always vibrate when she buried her face in his chest and asked him if "it was normal to kill, torture, make the other feel pain and don't feel guilt for it." There, at a cabin, with his gloves off, as he was trying to dismantle the knots in her hair, that she learnt his calluses were the smoothest thing than any silk she could dress herself with and he learnt that her bloodied fingernails were the most beautiful shade of pink he'd ever seen._

_"You don't see pain when you inflict pain. The only shocking part of it is the fact that they overlooked you for so long to need to see you sully them with blood as you clean your hands when passing by them." As she laughed and asked him of Jiraya wrote poetry instead of just porn, Sakura swallowed star collisions and would burn a supernova just to see his smile._

_Her hair was tied in a braid with no more knots now and her hands were clean.)_

"He wasn't just a rogue ninja, as we thought. The man had much more than he let it show. He gave a little bit of trouble." Kakashi pointed at his eye, his voice was darker than the night, even though he managed to keep it casual, as if he was talking about the furniture that didn't match his apartment. 

Sakura, in other hand, was almost gleaming in anger. Her chakra was unstable and it was flaring, not in the green light, but in an orange. Her aura wasn't of a medic, it was of a warrior. 

"The piece of shit," she spat on the floor. Wow. "thought he was fucking smarter than us. I ain't that good in interrogation 'cause sometimes I lose my temper, y'know," (yeah, Sakura, everyone knows.) "but this time, Kakashi snapped." That seemed to make her angrier.

"Sakura, I'm right fucking here. Don't talk about me as if I'm not in the room." He had something in his speech that Shikamaru knew only both of them would understand and no one else. 

"Let's say" her words were punctuate in pure ire "this fucker said some shit he really, really shouldn't." 

She walked past him in the table and grabbed a bottle and threw it at Shikamaru. 

When he began to complain, Kakashi lifted on finger — Sakura was now smoking his cigarette and when the fuck did she took it? 

Shikamaru was tired. He was losing focus. He didn't notice when Kakashi stole his lighter earlier, neither when Sakura stole Kakashi's cigarette and much less the way Sakura's fingers ran through Kakashi's hair and the way he looked up to smile at her and press lightly his hand at her thigh.

He was about to say they drank too much — because they did, but Kakashi cut him off, taking a sip of his own bottle.

"Don't be a baby and drink it. We got it from one of their men. It tastes like mint."

As he took a sip and it burned down to his gut, Shikamaru noticed how ungrateful he was a step about to be. They always had booze. Always. Sakura informed them once that one of the most important things to soldiers is their feeding and then she proceeded to put on the table the strongest shit he ever drank in his life. It had 70% of alcohol and was green. Sakura said she would give it to them in three cases and those three only: that day, as it was the beginning of a war none of them knew how much it would last; the day it ends, so they would celebrate. When she didn't speak for a while and didn't said what was the third occasion, it him them without words: the third occasion it is of we are to die for sure.

So, they had booze and good food. The alcohol was optional and exceptionally no one could _ever_ go to the field drunk. It was suicide. They had ninjas that were alcoholics, that's per sure, so their amount was of 55ml/day, so they could keep control on how much they were drinking — and if they were trying to get their fellas shots, they had little control. 

It might sound reckless to offer alcohol to soldiers, but it is precisely at times like these this men need it. Kakashi always says that if it was that way at his time, everything would be different. 

The way he speaks about this matter leaves no room for confrontation. _"Everything would be different. So much would've been spared."_ He said to every one and to no one in particular. _"It would be. It should be."_

Albeit nodding, no one seemed to catch the glistening in his eye. No one, but Tsunade. (And Shikamaru, that was smoking at a corner, watching Sakura pop three pills down without water)

Shikamaru wasn't the biggest fan of alcohol, but they always saved him the best and he was about to complain because they always drank strong shit. Not only tired and unaware, he was beginning to be an asshole.

As he passed the bottle back to Sakura he realised what his sharp mind should've deduced much, much earlier: she hadn't changed clothes in days. She and Kakashi had been there, fighting and interrogating, without a break, with all but booze and cigarettes. 

Shikamaru made up his mind and decided that when they passed a city, he would buy them a beer and a chocolate — and pepper to Kakashi pour over his chocolate, something like this.

Sakura took the last sip of her bottle and sighed, looking so much like her mentor it was scary. Clapping her hands, she said. "Up, up, we go. Things to do, intel to gather, motherfucker to spank, shit like that." and left the room.

Shikamaru would've asked something, as her tone was forcefully light and strained, but the gaze in Kakashi's eyes made him remember her statement from earlier about the guy saying something he really shouldn't have. 

They were now descending down a corridor, with moss in the walls, a ugly green tone and the walls were drown in humidity, the bottle back and forth between the two.

The hall was narrowed and they took several turns. It was a maze, good enough to rivaled the ANBU HQ. When they finally reached what seemed to be a plain wall, Kakashi cut his hand and smeared the blood on the stone. It squinted and opened with a loud _thum._ Two more sets of stairs and then, they reached a big room, with sparse cabinets on it. Five cabinets on total. It could've been a big room with other rooms, but it was almost like tents. Except they had chakra lines around them. Anyone without permission that'd try to run would have a really painful death. 

The shit was serious. 

They had to built four more bunkers in the past months, used mostly to interrogate and sometimes, to put those unable to fight out of the line until they recovered. 

They had five rooms, each with five cabinets. These rooms were at **Section C** , saved to interrogation. They were divided in 15 sections, that were nothing but small rooms saved to keep prisoners at dark, but that were used as markers to orientation. 

The **Section A** was saved for the strategists. It wasn't nearly as big as the **C** and not as complex to find and was divided in four rooms: one to plan the attacks, one to the defense, one to all the info they gathered and could be used and, the most important one: flee. 

They had over 200 ninja with them and they knew that some thing could go terribly wrong and they might need to vanish within hours, so it was the room full of fuinjutsu, escape routes, disperse techniques, ample range forbidden genjutsus. Only eight people had access to this section. It wasn't as big as session C, but it's walls were gigantic, with so many papers it was hard to know each was each. Only Kakashi, Shikamaru, Minato, Naruto, Tsunade, Sakura, Hinata and Temari had the permission to enter. (Temari was a goddamn fucking great strategist and, being the only one outside the Leaf, she always had new incomes they could use.) Anyone else that tried to enter, would meet the same chakra lines and die. 

The **Section B** was the one with the dorms. Was the normal one, without much thought. It was just bed rolls and bed rolls side by side, but one could request one proper bedroom. They had, actually, ten rooms with multiple bed rolls, as in shared rooms. People didn't complain, as there was no much use. When they wanted to fuck, no one gave a damn and there was so rooms no one used or some that were free at certain times.

Almost no one did request the private rooms, but biggest in hierarchy had theirs. Hierarchy is a bitch when you're not in it, but Shikamaru had his bedroom (a sad tent, but big enough to have a small, old, weird table and a place to place his chogi board.

Kakashi was the only one that didn't sleep in the section B. No one knew where he slept, actually. 

Kakashi commanded the biggest troop in history. In military terms, **XXXXXX** , what he did. 

In the military hierarchy, he couldn't go any higher. In the field, he was higher than the Hokage and now, he was both. 

He explained to Naruto the hierarchy, once, if he really wanted to be a Hokage and the shinobi world _always_ would face new wars. As Kakashi spoke, no one in the room dared to think of besting him. There was no way. He could be the War and Peace walking, as I read it once. 

It all depends on the numbers that are under your command. Kakashi commanded an Region, that goes from the strength 10,000,000-100,000,000 men, constituent units 4+ army groups, as 1 army group is 2+ armies, that's 400,000–1,000,000.

That was more than 100 million under him, but that can't go any higher. He was called General, but could be Field Marshal, Colonel General or Big Ass Bitch. 

Down him, was **XXXXX** , aforementioned, a Front, in which his 2+ armies go from 

2–4 corps, the strength of 100,000–200,000, the **XXXX** , called Army. The corps, a formation, 20,000–50,000, are the equivalency of 2+ divisions or legions, another formation, that are **XX** , 2–4 brigades or regiments, 6,000–20,000. The lone **X** , the brigade, 3,000–5,000 the constituent units of 2+ regiments, 3–6 battalions, that were 1,000–3,000 yadda, yadda, yadda. By each means, Naruto always fainted and had an instant ramen with sake. 

He looked up at Kakashi and said nothing but "How can this hat be white?". Shikamaru never thought Naruto could say something so deep.

The **Section D** was the kitchen and canteen. Sometimes they had food, sometimes they had pills. Sakura always worked her best for them to eat real food, because they needed to _eat_. Ration bars and food pills aren't food, they are to help you, not go sustain you. People used to complain about the quality of the food instead of being thankful for it. Instead of anger, Shikamaru saw tears in Sakura's eyes and then she disappeared among Kakashi — three bottles of sake with them. 

One day, it was Minato that stormed over them. He spoke about the wars he faced and told them how "bitch fuckers" they were being for complaining about Sakura's attempt to make 'em real, quality food. He also said "if you wanna go to the battlefield full to the ass in ration bars, don't come crying when you lose some piece of your body because you weren't feeling strong enough. It is on you being fucking ungrateful. It is not a third of her responsibility to give a fuck about it. She is medic nin, not a cooker. She does it because she _cares._ And that's how you thank her? I would be ashamed." No one else complained after that. Most of shinobi were perplexed by Minato swearing, but with time and circumstances, no one can keep their cool forever. And Sakura was almost a daughter to him. 

Everyone seemed to be out of who they were. No one would be chocked if Tobirama yelled and swore, but Minato was all smiles and his face was a stone in the field, paralyzing the enemies with fear, but no one would ever imagine he even knew the word "fuck" out Kakashi's or Kushina's mouth (she did actually had an amazing repertoire). War changes us all. 

The last session, the **Section E** , was their made up hospital. Was the cleanest place. It was separated in five rooms: the huge UIC that took the place of two room, the beds — an infinite row of white sheets, two operations rooms and PS.

Tsunade was on the tent they entered, where it read " _2241B Section 12 330076 C session"_ , her body supported only by the wall while she was panting and her henge dropped a bit, among with nasty cuts and burns. 

On the middle of the room, was the prisoner. He looked at them, smug in his features and have a toothless smile. 

"Oh, oh, if it isn't my dear pin—"

His voice died with blood filling his mouth as Kakashi punched him hard enough to broke a few ribs and cut his oxygen supply. The man's features changed abruptly. There was no smirk, just fear. 

He looked at Kakashi with his eyes low and blood spilling from the left corner of his mouth and an ugly purple pattern rise through his chest. Kakashi used a lightning punch and this was fucking amazing. No drag right now.

"Give us what we want." _And we let you go_ , is what usually is said after this phrase, but there wouldn't be no mercy for the man. Yuo, he learnt.

"But what do you want? Didn't I give enough information for that brain of yours to work with?"

In a flash, his whole body was shaken in electricity and he began to convulsion, white bubbles growing out it his mouth. And just as soon as it began it stopped. Yuo dropped his head in his chest and was having a hard time breathing. Tsunade was smiling. That was more terrifying than anything and, as Yuo lifted his head, he must've come to the same conclusion. 

She walked in his direction, crippling a little in her right leg and her older face was a hell of a sight. 

"So, our pretty brains worked out more than you think. But we still want more.

"We want the location."

"As I said you stupid bitch, I don't know where they are."

Oh, no. No one calls Tsunade " _stupid bitch"_. The man didn't have time to register his mistake, because, in a heartbeat, she broke his neck. 

Kakashi only sighed. 

"Tsuna, you so have to work your temper."

"Fuck off, brat."

Shikamaru rearranged all the notes on the table and began to read them, circling here and there, humming to himself while Kakashi made coffee. Sakura was attending to Tsunade and Lady Katsuyu simply popped in and crawled in all their shoulders. 

When he was finished and the coffee was over, Tsunade was already attending other injuries and Sakura moved to another tent.

"He really gave us a lot to work with. Why kill him?" Shikamaru asked lazily behind his cigarette, his plastic cup of coffee in his hands.

"He was a dead end already. No time to waste."

Finishing the sentence, he withdrew his tanto and decapitated the Yuo. Kakashi picked it off the floor and put it over a table, setting black flames in the body, that vanished off existence in seconds.

Shikamaru's brows finally lifted.

"Tsunade asked me to stick his head in a high metal steak. As a warning."

When Kakashi was already out of the door, Shikamaru said in a low voice. 

"What did he say?"

There was a long pause. He thought Kakashi wouldn't answer. 

And he didn't. 

Shikamaru stood there, staring at the pool that once was the corpse headless and blood coating the floor. 

"What a drag."

* * *

**three years before**

* * *

_August of 3027, 2 years before the beginning of the 4th Great Ninja War_

* * *

“She can't go.”

IT WAS SAID IN such a deadpanned tone it sounded like introducing yourself for the tenth time at the day, at the same time it sounded like a take out deal when you shift just ended: deprived of life, settled and unarguable. The tone itself was enough to raise both Tsunade’s eyebrows even before it was conscious to her.

Kakashi had already got on his feet and Tsunade regretted letting him up. Probably, he'd be less cocky if he was still staring at the floor as a reminder. 

Kakashi was standing in the middle of her office, his hands on his pockets, with a look in his face that made him look bored with a characteristic sleepiness in his eye, as if he was ordering a coffee just for the sake of doing something to get out of boredom. 

_(In his defense, he booked an appointment, got only two and a half hours late, knocked on the door, bowed and then spoke. Not much, but it is something.)_

He was ordering her around, giving her the look you give your wall when you run out of things to do – like she was something between a caterpillar and a grocery store’s shelf.

Tsunade lifted her eyes from the paperwork _she_ was giving a bored look and looked at him like he had forbidden sake production for life. A bigot could fall over his head and she’d be pretty much pleased right now.

“Excuse me?"

He kept his gaze low – the same you give when you eye a small child that just started crying, but you know you can still get away with it, so you don’t even bother before turning your back – and spoke like she was a child that had asked him the same question ten times.

“Sakura. She can't go." He stated. And that’s all.

“What are you talking about?" A thunder roared in the back of her mind and she wondered if it was the itch to break the table in two or the start of a very nasty headache.

He just said: "Sakura

"Sakura Haruno."

"Sakura Haruno."

"Sakura, my apprentice?"

"Sakura, your apprentice."

Jesus fuck.

"Hatake, I may have not seen much of you in action, but I know how you got your nickname. You don't need to keep repeating everything I say."

He just stood there staring at her, his dead fish expression betrayed nothing, one hand probably already holding his damned book, one eye behind that fucking Hitai-ate and he could be fucking sleeping for all she was concerned. The man was a fucking nightmare. 

He just stood there. Tsunade considered how harmful with would be to the village to snap his neck – financially speaking, the rest is another demerit for another time.

She looked back at him.

Dead air only.

It only lasted about two seconds before she started yelling.

"Hatake, I don't have all day. That was your fucking cue to speak."

She threw the pen she was using to blindly sign her papers into the table causing a little crack in it that didn’t go unnoticed by him, but the word was true that he had a deathwish, then. She was annoyed – and annoyed was just a sneeze from angry and angry is never good.

"Sakura can't go in this mission." Kakashi said like he was saying " _sit_ " to a dog.

Tsunade doesn't like to be ordered around. 

She got angry.

"You do realise you're talking to your Hokage, right, you brat?"

"Yes." Kakashi said simply, on the verge of indifference, not yet hitting insolence or disrespect, but, nonetheless, she arched a brow.

He got the message: he fucked up. Kakashi was a field man, not a autocrat. Dealing with the kids was his worst nightmare and he wondered every night how he survived it. They decided it was a good idea to take a S-rank close-to-be sociopath to take care of 12 year old kids. How they decided upon that was beyond him and would always be. He was used to state orders, to say " _kill_ ," " _leave no survivors",_ no " _focus the chakra on your feet", "try not to rip your eye off with this shuriken"._ And men from the field are assholes and not used to women in power. 

Kakashi was the fucking living legend, among few others in the Village, so he used to be the Captain in missions, not usually taking orders from women. At least, _he_ wasnt used to it. People poured too much into Hatake's bowl and that led him precisely to where he was standing now. 

So it wasn't _just_ because he was a sexist that he still didn't know how to properly treat Tsunade, but it came with years of conditioning. 

The same was worth for Sakura. that's why she's weak: she's a woman.

“Yes, Lady Tsunade.” he added with a bow. The woman didn’t blink. 

“Lady Hokage.” he tried again and she arched her eyebrow even further – he bowed further. It shouldn't be physically possible to an eyebrow to go even higher, but yet it did.

“Lady Hokage?" again – and he was with his upper body halfway down, but he still could see her over his hair.

She seemed to be having fucking fun with him not being fucking able to know how to refer to his own leader. He indeed needed to get out a bit more not just for killing. Maybe go to a bar with company not just after targets or to get blind drunk. Leave the house a little more, not only for the Memorial Stone, but to, well, bars and maybe some restaurants and try not to fall into pattern with Genma when he was up to "women houses". He wasn't the biggest fan of prostitutes, because, once again, he was used of this places for mission. It is easier to get people in your bed in _bars_ or the street market, the hospital, the library, the ANBU HQ, the Hokage Tower, the civil district — you just need to know how to talk to them.

Tsunade put her hands on the table and leaned her chin on it, brow still arched, the evil shadow of a smile.

Kakashi was feeling the bead of sweat on his forehead. How the fuck do you call the Hokage nowadays? He only reported _yes, no, dead, understood_. 

"Lady Hokage Tsunade?" 

Nothing. 

Ok, the woman can hold a stare, apparently for hours if you piss her off. Kakashi was growing self conscious. Were they playing some "stare your subordinate to death because he came in like a cunt” contest? Did he really offended her that much? 

"Huh, Lad-"

"Sit, Hatake."

He threw himself in the chair in the most respectful way he could. Yet, he sat on it as if it was his armchair and he was about to open his dirty books or just a cooking book and put his beautiful feet on the living room table, his ankles crossed and a hot mug of tea resting beside. 

“Take that fucking smug look off of your face.” Tsunade smiled to herself behind one pigtail that fell on her face when she downed to open the device at the middle of the table.

The Hokage liked to lie to herself that she had her _“Special Occasion Drinks”,_ but that was bullshit. It was just some expensive shit in some hardly different spot just as a disguise for others and for herself. It was an everyday thing.

When Naruto found her in that shithole with was supposed to be a Special Occasion, because Orochimaru crossed her path, bleeded in front of her, promised her Dan and her little brother back. It was just alcohol. She could lie all she wanted, but it was just an addiction anyway.

That's a common thing you do when you don't want to admit you don't have control anymore. Tsunade has many bottles disguised around the office, her home, the Hospital even, everywhere. She calls this bottled the "Special Occasion" ones. You know that really expensive wine your uncle you don't even remember the name gave you as a birthday gift five years ago and you keep telling yourself you will open it in a special occasion, when you finally get a promotion, married or killed? Yeah, that kind of bottle. Except that people like Tsunade have plenty of those and they are just a decoy. They are a lie she tells to herself — Kakashi tells similar lies to himself too. 

You can keep bottles wherever you want, call and label them whatever you want, but it won't change the fact you are delaying something you know it's coming and you are _avid_ for it. There is no denial when you look expectantly at the bottle every time you close the cabinet door, just expecting which day it'll be the excuse. Until you ran off excuses someday and they will be just bottles.

And she knew Hatake knew – he suffered the same, even though it seemed it would take him some years to realise his trips to the bar would become more and more frequent and he would realise way too late. And there’s nothing worse than too late.

(Years later, he told her that a poet named Bukowski once wrote that

"there are worse things

than being alone

but it often takes

decades to realize this

and most often when you do

it's too late

and there's nothing worse

than too late”

And the drunk womanizer – was it Kakashi or Bukowski who could tell – was goddamn right. And that's fucking sad.)

With her not-so-special bottle she picked one not-so-special cup and watched as his posture changed. Men aren’t used to women in power. Hatake was one of those and, honestly, she couldn’t blame him. He wasn’t used to woman like her, even though he had Anko as an acquaintance. And doubting Sakura was more than expected. She would be disappointed if he really trusted her to be a good shinobi. The girl was a fucking disaster, caring more about her hair and the Uchiha boy than dodging kunais. But that girl fled the village among the annoying piece of “avenger.” That Sakura was as dead as the Third Hokage and, some days, Tsunade wondered if it wasn't Orochimaru who murdered her as well, the day he killed the remains of a normal teen on Sasuke.

Tsunade sat in front of him and filled her glass three times and by the fourth, he cleared his throat, eyed the bottle, eyed the woman, eyed the distance to the window and to the door as much as he could without moving his head and was about to speak when she pointed a finger at him. 

“I won't allow this kind of behaviour. The Third was very complacent in a lot of ways I'm not.” She put the bottle on middle of the table, her glass with it.

_(He looked at it and remembered the page he stopped in Violence. It involved a bottle and an office. The precise moment was about to count how many cups were left of the beverage for the protagonists get drunk enough to have what was known as "blameless sex", the "drunk sex". It is a way to put sex in a scene when there is unresolved tension, but you just wanted to see them fuck so you get them drunk._

_The truth is, it is very hard to count how many cups it takes to end a bottle. Bottles don’t come with “You can’t swipe me on six glasses, watch out!” tags. People just guess or are just really used to it. This bottle was one of 750 ml. By his experience it would take six glasses of wine, five tall glasses of water, eight cups of sake and you can down it without any glasses in a record time of ten to twelve minutes without getting really nauseous or obstructing your nasal way by covering your mouth for too long. So he had four cups of sake._

_Looking back at Tsunade, he remembered how in love with her Jiraiya had to be, as all the protagonists of all the editions had her characteristics. Looking back at the bottle, he thought how much of a fool he was for trying to intervene of a mission of his ex student, whom he barely seen in the past years. But just as Jiraiya and his protagonists and his bottles and drunk sexes excuses, it all just pointed at how much he still cared.)_

Kakashi hold her gaze because looking away seemed the wrong thing to do. 

It was like she was daring him to drink it and he couldn’t read in between the lines on why she would want it, like she knew something he didn't or if it would be offensive not to drink it. So he just fucking did anyway. Free booze from the Hokage.

Kakashi took it in his gloved fingers, filling the cup to the top and seeing his calculations failed him by little – he had a little bit more than two and a half cups left – and didn't wait for an order. Strong shit. It hit the back of his throat in a burning way that left a hot sensation and some part of him thanked the woman. Though, special thanks wouldn’t take a place by the way she was looking at him and if her fame made her justice, he better just drink himself numb before she smashed him. 

He didn't fill it again. 

“She can't go.” It came out smoother, not an order anymore, but not pleading neither.

Not treating her like a subordinate, but not understanding she was the Hokage. For a genius, Hatake can be pretty stupid. 

Tsunade's been Hokage for years now, but he never engaged any conversation apart the scroll delivering and the same old, same old scolds. They talked a bit when they run into each other at the same bar, but it was rare as Kakashi didn't like to drink at known places and much less engage conversations. He didn't know much about her. Just the rumours, because everyone knows the rumours about everyone and that's all he had, the he said, she said. Kakashi was a difficult man. An impetuous one. Arrogant, sometimes. Even after Obito's death and life lessons, he still had in him his _name_ and, after all, in the end of the day, end of the life, all ninjas had was their name, their dog tags. They were numbers, soldiers, pawns. Just their names and their glory, nothing else. 

Kakashi knew more about Jiraiya and Orochimaru's as Sannins, but he seemed to forget Tsunade.

All men did. 

Tsunade rose from her seat and grabbed two other bottles and placed them on the table, putting the first bottle and the first cup aside and replacing the latter with two water glasses.

“Pick one.”

Her voice wasn’t harsh nor soft. It was a command, but as much rigid you talk to a bird escaping its cage. Kakashi pointed to the one adorned with blue patterns. She opened the other one.

Men like him don’t understand how it is to women like her to live in this world. It is an ugly world. It is such a wilderness. Every second you’re caught under life and death and not just yours. Your decisions can cost your life or others. It is not just about training, just about being good. It is about knowing. And knowledge doesn’t come in a textbook.

She filled both glasses and sat again. The lift of one eyebrow was all she gave as a stimulus for him to drink.

“She can't go” he repeated, _repeated repeated repeated_ (as he did in the mirror, convincing himself he had to say it, that the girl needed someone to point that out, that he needed to save her life, that she was useless and weak and he was strong and had to protect her because that’s what he does: protect, because he is so good at it) punctuating the words, with all respect he could put on them. “Lady Hokage” he finished, with a bow and a sip.

The Hokage's eyes were sharp. They were honey coloured just as Orochimaru's skin was too white like a rice ball and Jiraiya's adornment behind his eyes were red like pepper. It might look innocent, but it isn't. Tsunade isn't innocent because she was a medic. From time to time, people forgot it, and that was a fatal mistake. 

The same works for Sakura. Her hair was bubblegum, her eyes, mint sweet, but she was as much of an assassin as Kakashi. 

_(He was the one who taught her that. Why did he seem to forget that so often?)_

“Two questions for you, boy." Tsunade began, finishing filling her class. "One: Why? And two: What makes you think you can order me around?” It was simple and it was like acid corroding wood, not iron. It was faster and the effect was far more devastating.

All the words that left Tsunade's mouth felt like acid to him, bubbling his skin, burning it, cirrhosis full. He wish he had never spoke. But now it was being throw at his face. 

He was swallowing his words and they were _acid._

Tsunade was much more then they all took her for, he himself included. Two sentences and she suffocated him. He always heard the whispers. Voices echoing that he was a man of few words, but they always had great impact. Tsunade said nothing, really nothing, but that was like a punch on the gut. 

(Once, many, many years ago, before Obito and Rin and Minato-sensei, a Mist nin used an acid jutsu that hit him. He was able to escape in one piece, but he had the scar and would always have it. It was a great bubble at his torso, right above his left lung. He never forgot how much it burnt and how long it took to heal. Rin never scolded him for that. She treated that wound with care, as they all felt responsible because he only got hit to save them all. And, right now, Tsunade's words were just as acid as the one that etched his skin.)

Maybe it was the alcohol, maybe it was her eyes, maybe it was the fact that he realised he walked into the Hokage’s office – fuck.

“With all due respect” _too late for that, fucker_ “I apologize for my behavior,” he sighed the slightest and propped himself up properly in the chair “but she can't go.”

She just clicked her tongue.

“Either you suck at arguments or I am missing something.” Folic acid. “Why is that?”

Acetylsalicylic acid.

2/3 of the bottle was gone already. He didn’t notice.

“She won't be able to take it.” She is weak.

“Hum.” Hydrochloridric acid. “What makes you think that?" Nitric acid.

“I was her sensei.” She opened the blue bottle. It was dripping phosphoric acid all over the table. She poured them both. Why was he afraid of drinking he couldn’t tell. Was she drugging him? Why was it affecting so much? Wasn't he supposed to be a brick wall? Bricks don't melt.

Do they?

“I am pretty much aware.” The words behind her cup and down her tongue tasted like acetic acid, the one you use to remove nail polish just like the one she had on her hand. Did Sakura used nail polish at all? 

He drank and it tasted like poison, like snakes. Like hemlock – a poison that came from a flower, it paralyzes you and you stop breathing.

_(Many years ahead he would mistake sakura's from hemlocks and think that maybe they mistaken her birth name, cause he could feel that was the death he was facing in between, one deep breath among the other. He couldn’t move away, even when it burned traces amid, constricting, asphyxiating, choking – as he did more than once with an enemy and more than twice with a lover – like a moth is drawn to the flame and if he had the guts to he’d ask to be buried surrounded by hemlocks, sakuras and fire, ‘cause that was all he felt since that first sip on blue acid on that tower a lifetime ago.)_

Kakashi had many things to say about Sakura but when he was faced with the indifference bordering despise of the Hokage it seemed his words glued to his palate. One more sip, one less teeth, one more nail.

“She… She can’t handle this. Not these kind of stuff. She’s not a good ninja.” he said in a hurry, the words fighting to be on top of each other and he was getting drunk and so was she and she was explosive and strong and he was suicidal and careless.

"It is not her first mission as ANBU, Hatake." Those words should end the conversation. He should bow and turn away, thank her for her time, try not to trip over his feet and leave. 

He did none of those. 

"Sakura is weak." He said it again, bitting the words out like it was his time to spit venom. 

"You were her teacher."

"I taught her nothing."

"You know you did." 

("The princess."

what

_what_

"Princess?"

"From fucking Make Out Techniques."

Oh, yes. Yes. He nodded to himself as if he knew what she was talking about. 

He had no idea what she was talking about. 

"What about her?"

"What do you think of her?"

"What do I think of her?" he looked at her expecting an explanation. Something. An explanation on why she was dropping fucks as if they were simple pronouns, on why she was smoking, on she took his book, on why she was asking about characters from his perverted book. 

"Hu" he stopped, considering his answer, giving it a thought. Putting his hand on his chin and looking up. There was a cloud that looked a look like a snail. It was the Nara kid that liked clouds, right? He could see why. They had a very calming effect. She wouldn't want to know that. But it was a nice cloud. Very nice cloud. It was oddly well shaped and he had to wonder if he was smoking the right cigarettes and how much he had to drink already. Considering the sun, it was pretty early already, but that meant shit to him. He was beginning to feel thirsty, but not yet. (He wasn't there yet.) The cloud was moving and the snail was growing fat. If he pointed at the cloud would she calm down? 

He looked at her from the corner of his eye and she looked like a spoiled children that didn’t get her favourite flavor of ice cream. He wasn’t wrong when he said she couldn’t take the mission.

Sakura had crossed her arms in front of her chest, a foot tapping in the floor, one brow raised, a murderous look on her green eyes. Her eyes weren't a grass green or a leaf of a pine tree or a cactus green. They were a nice green. Nice cloud and nice green. 

They were green like good pot, truth be told. But Kakashi didn’t like pot.

His mind was slurring around irrelevant things. It used to work like that when he was trying not to think about something.

He wanted to be and asshole, but he wasn’t about to tell her he jerked off a thousand times over the years to the princess. Nor that not always it was the princess’ description in his mind — well, mostly, the princess looked like Tsunade and he was forced to admit that when she became the Hokage and despite liking strong women, masturbating to her just seemed wrong to say the least. He changed her hair color, her face features, her body, her voice, based on the women he slept with — as much as he killed that much he fucked as well and, hey, a man has needs. So, yeah, he had a pretty vast repertoire.

That train of thought drove him dangerously to Sakura — he never pictured pink hair with green eyes before and he wasn’t going to. That wouldn’t make him a pervert. That would make him a pedophile and he definitely was a bunch of bad things, but that wasn’t one. If he took pleasure in killing someone, pedophiles were always the top ones. 

Kakashi read a lot and he knew he would eventually come across psychology books that would defend paedophile as a disease and there are plenty of those. He read them and then set them on fire. You can't cover it with such an excuse. Some things are just inexcusable and pedophilia is one of those — Orochimaru was one of these and he could never forgive The Third for his complacency of letting him slip through his fingers. Even among the villagers, some people would deny it and say that he _wasn't_ a pedophile, that he was a fucking disturbed scientist, but after so many years of chase and learning about the guy, he brainwashed children and it was clear they developed Stockholm Syndrome and that his relationship with the children wasn't purely and uniquely "experimental". It would be a privilege to kill him. And Kakashi didn't know whose hands Sakura would run to. He was sure as hell he didn't want her to face his same destiny. Some days, he questioned how far his blind loyalty for the village was worth losing his innocence so young. 

But then again, she was no longer with her arms crossed in front of her or tapping her feet and deciding he wasn’t going to tell her he masturbated a lot to the princess, he just set up on saying “What did you ask again?” and that seemed to be the very, very wrong answer.

He could’ve just said “I like her.” but that wouldn’t be enough.

Her eyes widened and her jaw dropped just a tiny, tiny bit and then anger filled her. 

He could see Tsunade in her. 

Thank God she didn't have paperclips. 

She did not but take one more drag and smashed the cigarette right beside his head, maybe burning one strand of hair. Poor tree. Poor strand. It was a lemon tree. It was a baby strand.

“You are fucking kidding me.”

He looked down at her, a deep curtain of smoke between them. Kakashi said nothing, just smelt the small hole in the tree and his strands, reclining a bit more in the trunk, another drag and she grew angrier. Fuck that.

"You are impossible." Sakura shook her head, looking beyond surprise "You fucking asshole." 

She knew she shouldn't talk to him like that. He was her superior; a feared and legendary ninja; her former sensei; and a fucking asshole. 

“I am your superior, Sakura.” his tone was hard now, the tone he used on them when they misbehaved. “Treat me like one.” There it was. The pang of hurt. Anger and hurt were friends. She was angry about what she heard someone saying. Now, he had to say and she would leave.

“You’re pissing the shit out of me, Sakura.”

At that, her anger died a little. Kakashi never spoke to them like that. She knew he swore with the magnitude of a drunk gambler — worse than Tsunade, even — but he didn’t talk to them like that. That felt like being an equal, but it also felt painful. For the first time ever, she wished he would just mess with her hair and give her an eye crease.

She would doubt herself later, but she stood her ground.

“What do you think about the princess from Make Out?” Voice hard, chin up, her whole postured said she wasn’t a scared kitten. She was a woman, a kunoichi.

He didn’t believe.

"Well" he started in a really bored tone, as if explaining to Naruto why he couldn't eat ramen three times a day "I think she is pretty much amazing." there. Easy to understand. In few words. Just like he did with Naruto.

"She is pretty much amazing?" her tone, on the other hand, was like she was questioning Naruto some stupid answer he gave to a serious question. 

"Yep" in a tone like he was ending a conversation with Naruto when he started to talk too much and he wasn't even listening anymore.

"She's a damsel in distress." it was an affirmation as if she was telling Naruto he wouldn't get a date with her, for the twelfth time a day — not so angry, but really impatient.

"That's the idea." he said in a tone as if he was telling Sasuke to fuck off and drop being an insufferable asshole — bored and cutting short the conversation. 

She tried to take the book back when he opened it in some random page to tune her off.

She buffed. 

"The princess needs Taiko to protect her." as if she was retort the Yamanaka girl when she said something that made Sakura livid, but she didn't want to show, so just called her Pig — bloody angry, but trying to keep cool to avoid beating the crap out of anything in her path.

"It is the plot." as if telling Naruto some really obvious thing, like 'ninja need stealth to survive, not just jump in making orange shadows' — bored and annoyed.

"But he falls in love with her because she is a strong woman and not just a hot piece of meat." as if defying something someone said sometime somewhere that it is dumb and she was right when she did indeed actually was right — arrogant with growing impatience.

"Did you read it?" as if surprised when Sasuke managed to say a full sentence instead of just 'hun' — with disbelieve and distrust.

"Yes, I did read it." as if yelling at him because he was late.

"You're underage." as if reprimanding Sasuke for thinking he was the best shit ever lived — matter of fact, obvious "It has a clear 18 warning" on the cover." 

"Do I look like I care?" as if telling Naruto for the first time she wouldn't go in a date with him — very, very, very pissed. Very. 

"Ok, but you should." as if giving a lecture about them being unable to catch a cat — bored, faking disappointment, stating it as the final word.

She just waved him off — yeah, she did look like Tsunade if you tip your head to the right and place sake in front of her. 

"You know very damn well we stop being considered children under aged the moment we graduate the Academy." she said as if Inner Sakura took control — on the borderline to angry yelling "I am not a child anymore. I haven't been one since I saw Sasuke " the word hurts "bleeding all over in your genjutsu, the very first day."

The very first day, where Sakura was the weakest. All he had to do was cast an idiot image and she fainted. She was just a girl playing ninja — didn't she realize that? Girl's play wouldn't keep her alive out there. Strong will — the Will of Fire wouldn't. The Will of Fire is a pretty nice speech, but it doesn't save you if you are incompetent. And that's what Sakura was all that time. 

He could blame himself, but he could also blame her.

Kakashi didn't know what to say. He still didn't know where she was trying to go. 

"Oh, the very first day, you say? With bells, no lunch, tree trunks and stepping on Sasuke's face, throwing Naruto high into the sky and you passing out just because you saw a face Sasuke with some cuts?" He scratched his chin. A rubble was starting to grow and God bless masks. "I remember it like it was yesterday." Kakashi looked condescending at her, a bloody smirk on his face. 

"Iam goingto slapyourface out ofyourface." She gritted out of her teeth. 

He smiled a bit more. 

"Come again?"

The very first day, where Sakura was the weakest. All he had to do was cast an idiot image and she fainted. She was just a girl playing ninja — didn't she realize that? Girl's play wouldn't keep her alive out there. Strong will — the Will of Fire wouldn't. The Will of Fire is a pretty nice speech, but it doesn't save you if you are incompetent. And that's what Sakura was all that time. 

He could blame himself, but he could also blame her.

Kakashi didn't know what to say. He still didn't know where she was trying to go. 

"It was — it wasn't _yesterday._ It was years ago, before they left."

"You can only use the expression "years ago" when you mean it."

Kakashi was fucking with her and serious at the same time. One and s half, almost two years ago is not enough. Even with the life they ended up living.

"I am not a child! I am not stupid, I-am-on-a-diet Sakura, I am not Sasuke's puppy and lackey for him to kick me for years, I am not some brainless fucked up concept! And I actually can handle fucked up missions."

"That's what all this was about?" All the yelling and life lessons? He could feel his body tense up and he sure as fuck wanted to punch a whole in the ground. In about two hours he had to leave to assassinate and retreat unimaginably important documents to the security of the whole Fire Nation and he was trapped with _this?_ He was making her pay for his meals for the next ten years. "Your missions? Your _ANBU_ missions you are clearly not ready to take? I am not signing the papers for your admission, Sakura."

"And why not?" 

Sasuke left almost a month ago already and Naruto posed him the same question precisely nine days before and then left with Jiraiya: why can't I be in Anbu? Why am I not suited for it? What lacks for me to be suited for it, then? 

Kakashi said no to both, but for different reasons, just as he would say it to Sasuke. Naruto didn't have the control over the Nine Tails and even though it was very effective against enemies when the time come, it was also too dangerous around comrades

and would be even more dangerous around people Naruto barely knew for his feelings settle down and distinguish. Sasuke wouldn't come in because the darkness would overcome him and he already had too much of it in him, he didn't need more. He didn't need all the dirty job regular shinobi can't do handled to him so he could be swallowed more deeply into the void Kakashi knew too well. As for Sakura it was pretty simple: she was too weak and inadequate. Sakura wouldn't last a day. She would quiver and beg to be sent back after her first mission, it didn't even need to be a though one. 

"For starters, you are a spoiled little brat that's just as bad as Sasuke for thinking the whole world evolves around you. And don't even try to begin criticizing Naruto because he might be loud and Hokage repetitive, but why do you even want to get into ANBU? Respect, just as Naruto? Power, just as Sasuke?"

Sakura was shaking, he could see that. He was called a spoiled little brat too and it was by Minato-sensei. The cut that ripped off his eye was a massage compared to that. But he needed to hear that. Sakura needs to hear this.

"And that's all?"

Kakashi also learnt through the years two methods to avoid crying.

One is producing saliva. Lots of it. Keep watering your mouth and try to focus on it. Just keep doing it and control your breath. Try not to listen so intently what people are saying. It helps. 

The second is one that sometime is more effective. Grit your teeth. With all the strength you have. Just do it. Creak them, really, really hard. Is a really bad advice, but sometimes you just _can_ 't cry so you will face to bite your own teeth and breathe. Focus on your lungs and teeth. Crack them, but fuck don't break them. If you feel you are taking this too long, stop it. 

But these are two methods that work and Kakashi didn't know which Sakura was using. He was the one that taught her that, after all. 

"You couldn't bare it."

"Wouldn't I? What do you even know about me?"

"I kn—"

"You know _shit._ Stop that! That's what it is all about. How pissed off and angry and, and, and offended — 'cause it is just Team Seven all over again: Sakura can't take care of herself so let just keep her in shadows 'cause we have to be a four people team, otherwise she wouldn't even be here." She took a breath and those words alone could swallow them both as a hurricane, a seaquake and bury them alive. "Do you remember when you taught us tree walking?" her voice

was quieter now, softer, but her eyes were a whole field devastated by war. 

"Of course." his voice was softer and he dropped all his demeanours. You can't hurt what is already bleeding. There is no point on sharpening an open wound. Is there?

"I managed on my first try. I know how rare it is, I know how much of control that demands. I checked later, you know. In our generation, after the Third War, only five people did it before me." _you were one of them_ "And what did you say to me?" her voice was minimal, a whisper. He just shook his head. "You said nothing." 

She let it weight on the air. A gush of wind passed over them and her hair splashed over her eyes as did his. 

She was a nice colorful picture, full of hurt and splashed in the background, over people's eyes, but always shoved out of the way. Always there, but not there enough. Sakura was background noise. And the worse was that she knew. 

"You said nothing. You just used it to rub it at the boy's faces, to make them more competitive. Did you even noticed that I did on my first try or you were just expecting for something to throw at them? Because you were there for them, not for me."

"That's not how it was." he blinked, serious, trying to convince her —convince himself. 

"Yes, Kakashi-" a brief pause, filling her lungs with air "-sensei. It was literally like that. I was always staring at the back of your three and I felt useless and disregarded. But no more. Man, no more at all _. I can take care of myself."_

"Stop lying to yourself, Sakura."

Her eyes flared in anger and she prep her fist back, filled with all the chakra she could master at it, feeling all of it running to her joints, white knuckles and aimed to his face. She was sure to break something. 

The tree fell, even though she punched at one of the highest branch. Her strength wasn't up to that level so she was the silver line at the bottle of the free — Kakashi's raikiri making fun of her. He cut the bottle of the free to make it fall, even though, when she looked it closely, she could see she ripped a bit of its roots. She smiled. She wasn't weak anymore. _Not anymore._

Kakashi was gone in a flash of light. She was breathing as hard as a bull, dangerous as if he was provoking her with a red flag.

_(Bulls are colorblind. It isn't the color that make them attack. They are hurt and go to the arena bleeding. Bulls aren't sanguine creatures alone. They won't attack you on the street if you have a red shirt — as Sakura always has. It isn't how cartoons show to entertain. For a bull to be wild and dangerous enough to make it a show, they are hurt very, very badly, because the man has no limits._

_So Sakura wasn't angry just because or due Kakashi's words. It was way deeper than just that. Bulls are colorblind and so is Sakura's anger.)_

As the tree fell, his chakra vanished. She didn't care if he was under the ground, she was going to break it anyway.

Sakura charged her fist again before even trying to sense him but he beat her to it. His fingers close on her wrist and she barely had the time to turn around before he got her arm behind her back and shoved her face down the ground, his face was just an inch away from hers, his breath trickling her skin.

She was one knee at the ground, the other supporting her weight the best she could without falling, the fallen tree beside them, one wrist trapped in Kakashi's hand, the other stuck between her knee and her stomach. He was crouching, just half of his body turned to her — just his left side. She could only see cloth.

His breath was just as hot as her cheeks, but his fingers were just as cold as her chakra. She could feel the grass tickle her skin and smell the earth under her face, everything around them mute and she recognized a genjutsu when she saw one.

"Why did you cast a genjutsu?" She didn't have to spoke over a whisper, trying not to an snap, her voice was breathy and shaky. Her lungs were constrict and he could feel her heart under his fingers. It was rushing. 

She was facing forwards and Kakashi had only half of his body turned to her. She couldn't see his face. Nothing. His eyes could be turned anywhere. He could be ignoring her as she was there, right in front of him, as he did so many times. 

She tried to jerk free only for him to hold tighter.

"Why cast a genjutsu?" It was over a whisper now, angrier. He didn't give anything away. His chakra wasn't flaring, his breath wasn't shaking. He just moved out of the way of her punch and was now holding her by the wrist the same way he held and threw the boys by the rooftop.

He voiced the resemblance.

"When the boys aimed to each other all I had to do was hold them by the wrist" he tightened the grip to show it "and threw each in separate ways. They were going to kill you." His voice was as detached as ever. He could be with his book open for all that matters. 

"I know." 

"You always had the ability to genjutsu." She thought about thanking him, just mentally, but he amended "That doesn't make you good at it."

"You —"

Red red redredred 

Her kipao was red. She always wore it that way. She liked that color, it is a pretty color. It speaks volumes by itself. It is a color that is alive. It is pretty much like her. She always wore her heart on her sleeve. 

All she could see was red now.

She never hated one color so much.

Kakashi was speaking again, right into her brain and there was no difference into whisper or scream. 

"So you _think_ you can undergo assassination, torture, killing children, killing any and everything that gets in your way, innocent civilian, betraying the others, mistaken their loyalties, _being_ tortured, deprived of food, water, daylight, friends, your own identity, knowing that at any moment you may have to turn around and kill the one that is sleeping right next to you?"

She didn't recognize that tone in his voice. It wasn't detached, it was closer to the way he spoke to then when he was to teach a suffering boring lesson, but not quite there. It was not his teaching voice, annoyed but at least trying a tiny, minuscule bit drop of faux patience because he was talking to people that didn't know how to walk on water when he was user to give orders on how many they would kill in one blow. But it was not his deadpan voice. 

It was somehow close to an order, but soft, like the first time he told her she _had_ to kill that woman. She cried — and when he sighed and went to kill the woman himself, the whole world screaming "Sakura is weak", she drove the kunai into an artery at woman's jugular in the middle of her despair to be useful, to be a ninja, washing both of them in blood.

Sakura had her first panic attack that day. 

She stayed glued to the ground in her knees in front of the woman, blood thick even in her eyelids, trying not to blink too much because she was afraid her eyes could turn red. Kakashi touched her shoulder and she tried to attack him with the kunai that still embed at the woman's neck (she never learnt her name. It was easier that way) and failed. The kunai was stuck and she would drop the woman's body in top of hers if Kakashi wasn't fast enough to put her up and out of the way of the corpse. She was twelve. 

("Why?" she asked him when they reached a river. She wouldn't make all the way back that bathed in blood. "Why did you make me do it?" At first he didn't answer and his gaze was far, far away, like it always was. "Why did I had to do it?"

"Because you had to. As a ninja, you had to." His tone was final with his one eye staring at her. He gave her room for more questioning. But she would never know the answers and she never asked them.)

She had so many more questions, but when she looked around herself and saw the clean water turn dark, all she could see was the woman's body. That was the only time she knew she cried and Kakashi didn't took her as weak. She entered the river full clothed. He asked her where her clothes were and he carefully folded them besides the river with a soft towel that wasn't hers. Sakura cried until her body began to shiver from the cold air and her fingers were crunched. When she came back to the camping, Kakashi put real shrimps at her can and said nothing. She said nothing in return, but she understood. They never talked about it.

He had that tone again, but it wasn't that nameless body that she was going to kill in her mission. She had all the names in her scroll.

"You are a very emotional person." and that is a flaw, it goes without saying. "Have you pictured you might have to sleep with someone? Months of being undercover, growing attached, fucking him and then killing him, cold and dirty, as you take a bandaid off. Seduction isn't about sucking lollipops and looking naughty. Is much more raw." she felt a shiver running down her spine. Her skin was still burning and so was his breath, but every syllable made the air hit her cold. His hand was still holding her wrist with the same strength. He gave away nothing and she knew she gave away everything. "You are _not_ suited for a Black Ops, Sakura".

With her head in such a bad angle she could feel all the discomfort of the position again and looking into his eyes was the same as being blinded by the sunlight — you can't see anything because you see too much.

She was too young indeed. 

The genjutsu dispelled.

With his head a bit tilted to the side (like a dog) he thought she was going to throw a tree at his face or something. He was expecting yelling and more fucks coming his way. Or maybe that she'd run away. 

He just wanted to finish his book — and jerk off in the shower thinking about anything but her, not just because it was wrong supposedly but because.

She sighed, sounding impatient but with an afrontous look — like she knew something he didn't. 

"Well, sensei," her voice didn't waver, but it would as soon as she left. She came back at him with a smirk, one eyebrow raised and a smug look on her face "you are right."

He was right, as in really right about it and she couldn't handle it? It was that easy go convince her, about her own incompetence, just by putting raw the true nature of the mission — plain as the daylight and cold as mornings when the sun doesn't shine. It was their life, after all. And he was right.

"You're right." Her smile grew wider, her legs began to shake. "That is precisely the job description and I knew the nature of it when I applied for it. Also, that is precisely what I have do to and probably how I'll feel." Stupid girl. "But you are also wrong." he was leaning against a tree opposite to her where she was standing in the middle of the clearing, now full of sound. When she spoke, her voice was cold and she sounded so much like Haku he regretted deep down letting her listen to him talk. That didn't fit the girl he knew.

(But did he ever knew her at all? Do shinobi know each other? They're always so buried trying to keep away from each other the burden of their traumas that you will never know someone truly, you will never understand their nightmares or what makes them sweat cold at night. Their hands will shake now and there and you won't know what to say because they don't tell you what you need to know and you do the same. Shinobi never truly know each other. He didn't know Sakura and she didn't know him. It was the façade that was broke and he should've know that.) "I won't budge and cry my way home nor let guilt swallow me, not really, 'cause that is what we do for a living. We kill to protect our village, we kill to protect each other. This feeling overcomes all the others." 

Her smile was dead, pink hair falling at her left side of her face, her words cold. From his place Kakashi didn't budge, didn't blink. Didn't know particularly what to do with her words.

"You taught me that, Kakashi-sensei. You taught me about loyalty and bravery."

"I hated teaching."

"We all know."

His words weren't mean and neither hers. Just the truth.

"To teach someone how to be a ninja is to teach how to be a bad person." 

With that, she sent daggers to his chest. But he didn't believe she actually believed what she was saying.

"I didn't taught you that." He said too fast to be nonchalant. He didn't care. 

That was the sweet, annoying, love sick, cry baby Sakura. The Sakura that did nothing but make a fool of herself for a boy that only treated her like garbage and she kept coming back like an obedient pup. The Sakura that wouldn't kill a chicken, a bird, a squirrel to survive, 'cause she hadn't that in her, in her heart.

The Sakura that actually killed a woman.

_(Just like Naruto cried when he killed a bunny he cried when he killed for the first time. He then lifted his chin and moved on. Sasuke didn't cry — in front of them. Killing isn't the same as hurting or incapacitating someone. Nothing can prepare you to that.)_

_to be a ninja is to be a bad person)_

She held her cup, closing one of her eyes, aiming. When she threw it, he dodged. When she threw a paper clip, he caught with his hand. When she threw a small book – about orange cakes – he caught again and placed on the table. Bottle – dodge; scroll – catch; fucking kunai with a paper bomb (not a strong one, at least) – dodge (poor wall); case – catch; ink case – catch; when it came to the chair, he had to raise and his chair took the blow and now there was two broken chairs. However, she laughed.

Turning her back to him and leaning on her desk, she rolled the cup on her hand as she spoke and she was all lysergic acid – (6aR,9R)- N,N- diethyl- 7-methyl- 4,6,6a,7,8,9- hexahydro indolo- [4,3-fg] quinoline- 9-carboxamide¹.

“During the Second War you were a toddler, too small to comprehend, but already too smart to miss the seriousness of the magnitude unraveling under your small feet. Do you remember your mother?” And that was it.

Fluoroantimonic.

The strongest of acids. It’s a mix whose acidity surpasses the highest found in nature: 100% sulfuric acid. The mixture of hydrofluoric and antimony pentafluoride is considered the strongest among superacids and was created to react with materials that others cannot handle. However it is not able to corrode everything - since corrosion does not depend on strength. One thing, nevertheless, is certain:

when corrosion occurs, the damage is irreversible.

He filled his cup to the top, spilling drops – fucking melt the fucking table he doesn’t care – and the alcohol burned him and he wished his curp burned her as well.

“No.”

“Hum.”

And they fell in silence.

It was almost midday.

Men like Kakashi don’t know what to do with women in power and Tsunade doesn’t know what to do with an orphan traumatized by war that by a miracle didn’t turned into a sociopath. Or she knew exactly what she was doing. Maybe it was a gamble. Maybe she was drunk.

“Enemies have a tendency to name the surviving, like is their duty, like they can, like they own it. Hanzo named me, Jiraiya and Orochimaru (oxyuranus microlepidotus; bitter, bitter) the Three Legendary Sannin. And that’s how the world sees us. Legendary. With our summons, with our power, with our past. The "Flee on sight" on us. We’re _legends_!” Despite the cheer the word cared, the seven letters were sour like a dying lemon over your grilled fish.

Tsunade turned around to look to him and he didn’t know if that was a tear on her eye or the sun making myriads. She was drunk and so was he. She pointed with her chin and he grabbed another bottle, a smaller one. With her chin, again, she invited him to sit aside her on the table, looking at the city. 

Kakashi filled his glass and she said in a hurry 'drink it up, drink it up, boy' and he did. As soon as he finished, she threw both cups out of the window, the glass shattering the beautiful view. The remainings of liquid were not enough to form any rainbow, but undoing is a form of breeding and the splintered, shattered pane window on the carpet looked more like melody than acid, for once.

“I didn’t want to be legendary. Nor Hokage. I wanted to be a drunk gambler.” she took a swing from the bottle and passed it to him. “Your father deserved his title, however.” Tsunade was facing her grandfather, the God of Shinobi and his brother, the Creator; Sarutobi Hiruzen, the Professor; the Yellow Flash of the Leaf, his sensei; and herself. “You know, he was adored. I admired him. So much. He was up to be Hokage.” at that, Kakashi swallowed harder, the beverage was stronger, the subject was hell, her words sting in various parts he didn’t know could sting. "He was greater than the three of us, that's the true and everybody knows. It is just… _spiteful_ they don't talk about it. Seeing him in battle was a sight, one that scarred most. He made it look like art, he made it look easy. In his hands, it looked like justice."

Wide-eyed, he didn’t turn to her, but stared to her face in the mountain, as if the stone could give him the answer to all the question he had yet to formulate. “The White Fang of the Leaf.”

She didn’t say anything else. They just kept exchanging the bottle, until it was over. 

They were drunk. 

Her cheeks were rose and so was his. Both were tipsy and they had the whole day to face. Two remaining chairs in the office, opposite to one another, and the lighter was thrown between them, the light smoke of the cigarette dancing in the sun.

“Do you know how old Sakura is now?”

He didn’t mind the change of the subject.

“No.”

“There is a bottle at your right, a small one, the liquid is a bit brownish. It’s yous. At your left there’s another one. Hand me that.”

They had no cups anymore and they were drunk.

The alcohol still worked.

“She’s not fifteen.” He didn’t look up. He knew what she meant. _At fifteen you were an ANBU captain. You killed more cruelly then I got drunk in the past two years as Hokage_. “She can fucking handle this." Tsunade took a long swing, knowing what his next reaction would be. "She did already.” 

He barely lifted his head when he asked, but his voice was strained — he was angry.

“How did I never known about it?”

“Classified.”

“A mission like _this_ classified?”

“You’re ANBU, brat, not the King of the fucking World.”

"I am no longer an ANBU captain, Lady Tsunade." It was hard to swallow. He'd seen her ANBU mask already and her paychecks, but not that. "I am the Lieutenant. This kind of things _do_ pass through my jurisdiction."

"No, they don't. If _I_ don't want to, they don't. You know she's been placed in T&I."

"Which is and always has been my jurisdiction and I am the captain of most mission of this division."

"She doesn't go for captains, Hatake. She works solo when it comes to this."

Just as he did.

He hated being placed into teams and teams hated to be placed with him or under his command. He never ceased to be the cold blooded murdered he gained his fame for and some people just couldn't deal with it. Some people just couldn't place properly his stained books with the eye creases. 

Kakashi liked working alone. He always did, but he remembered when he had to take Naruto with him to an ANBU mission — without Sakura. 

It was in the middle of his training. He just popped out of thin air, just like he liked to. Jiraiya rolled his eyes, but Naruto still thought he was amazing, so it was worthy. He needed them to help him in an assassination. To Jiraiya's utter and complete surprise Naruto just said "Yes, sure. Is it infiltration or quicker?" the very same tone someone asks if they could help to cut some hortaliças from their garden. Naruto was used by now to have his hands dirt with blood and just Sasuke too — as well as Sakura, but for some reason he managed to forget that. 

Their mission was a success. It was pretty simple, he just needed to update the Hokage about Naruto's development and if it was being fruitful. It was. Naruto's Rasengan was much more accurate and he wasn't the dumb piece of orange shit he was when they left. He was quick not only to follow orders without running to the front lines just to prove he was good, but coming up with small strategies along the way. He wasn't the loud brat anymore. Well, he was still and probably would always be. People might chance, but their essence will never. But he was "less worse" because a "bit better". His obsession with Sasuke was just as alive as the three of them and trying to persuade him was the same to try to convince him that ramen was shit.

But in all the occasion, he forgot about Sakura. Looking back, he managed to forget about her somehow. 

When she asked to be in ANBU he _knew_ they would decline her. 

And they did. 

Just for a fucking month later take her in. 

Team 7 became a kind of specialized assassination group. They killed much more than any of the Rookie 9. Maybe — but just maybe — Kurenai's had some resemblance, but they acted more in trailing the victims than actually killing them; either way, their hands were dirty even though Kurenai always closed their always, specially Hinata's. Perhaps, that's why she was so awkward around people. Everyone has their own way to cope and hers was denial to the highest level. 

Kakashi's team, on the other hand, learnt (after panic attacks, missions they put themselves on the suicide brink, quietly crying during the night) to finally facing that's what's being a shinobi is about. 

The Academy doesn't teach you that.

And Sakura proved to be the best of them all. She learnt to swallow the bile and carry own, even when she cried and threw up when she thought no one was seeing. But _that_ 's why she could never be a Black Ops. You don't have time for it. You don't have enough room for feelings like it.

But they took her in despite all that.

She was working developing poisons and any kind of chemical solution to be used in interrogations. She was still the temp in the scheme and Kakashi stopped paying attention to her. He had a lot in his hands and every night when he finally got home he had too much blood to wash out his uniform and body to think about Sakura and if she was taking care of herself or if she got the Naruto Syndrome and decided she could take on the world and died. 

Somehow, being a high level authority, he knew she was still there. The name of the deceased always went to him, so he would designate the right ones to deliver the news to the families. You can't send Naruto or Sasuke to this kind of shit. 

It continued this way, then. Sakura was alive, he was always almost dead and he always had much more dangerous missions to ran, attend, order or throw himself into. Sakura was at her usual place performing her role of background noise.

One of these days her name could come to him as deceased and he wouldn't even know _when_ or _how_ it happened and _why did he let it happen._

He just drank. 

That he knew, that he was used to. That was no surprise. Getting drunk to swallow feelings and worries he knew how to do. But to understand Tsunade sent Sakura on this type of mission, he didn't know how. So he just drank.

Fuck Sakura then. Let her sleep with whoever the Hokage wanted her to. He had no obligation there.

Tsunade’s words weren’t acid anymore. It was just rage, but it wasn’t the stupid explosive rage everyone took her for – an unstable woman. No. She was fucking cruel when she wanted to be.

And she was succeeding.

The woman was angry at him, furious, maybe, because even after years he marched in trying to tell her what to do and demanding to know what happened, when happened and why, as if it still was _his_ to tell. But, as once he told Iruka that Naruto, Sasuke and _Sakura_ weren't his students anymore, but _his_ , Kakashi's, now Sakura was Tsunade's. He had no business there.

He knew what she was going to say next before she lifted her eyes to bore into his that were already staring into hers – not defiance, no boredom, no indifference. He wasn’t an open book, but somehow a loyal soldier, but still one that stood his ground, even if it cost his head. He still cared about Sakura. He promised everything would be okay and he wasn’t about to let some dirt old fuck lay his hands on her just for the sake of the mission.

People die because of blindness of following strict rules. And she wasn’t dying either getting hurt. She was his responsibility.

_(you are forever responsible for what you have tamed, said a little prince)_

“No.”

“No what?” Tsunade was acid no more. She was corrosive at the moment.

Corrosive substances pose serious risks to people's health, including damage to the eyes, skin and other tissues, and inhalation or ingestion may affect the respiratory tract or gastrointestinal tract. Chemical burns are often fatal.

One of the methods that can be applied in the field to reduce hazards is to neutralize the spilled product. This technique consists of adding a chemical – drink the pain away, Kakashi.

“Sakura.”

“Sakura what, Hatake?!”

She lost it.

They say pregnant woman “glow” (Sakura late told him that the idea that pregnant women experience a “pregnancy glow” is real. The “glow” comes from an increase in blood volume, estrogen, and progesterone. More blood flow to the skin gives a rosy appearance, and makes the face appear fuller as well. It still freaks the shit out of him.), but he was sure Tsunade was glowing on pure rage resonating out of her.

“Sakura cannot go. I already lost too many to allow –” he was cut shortly when the bottle reached the wall milliliters behind where his face was and he was kinda sure that could be fatal.

“You can not allow? You, Hatake? You never gave a fuck about her!”

“That’s n–”

“Shut your fucking mouth before I rip off your tongue!” she threw the chair out of the window.

A woman with a brown hair and a pig started opening the door and – “Shizune, get the fuck outta here!” – was welcome with this. “Hatake, you… you… You piece of shit! You march into my office to order me to cut off a mission because you think you can, uh?” a vein on her forehead was pulsing. She was a warrior. “You are a fucking legendary battlefield asshole, jack head with your nicknames, but guess the fuck what? _I am your boss, your HOKAGE and if I fucking tell you to jump the only thing you say is h o w – h i g h.”_

She was pacing the office, throwing the things off of her table and she looked like a puma concolor in a human body, in all its rage for losing its prey — losing its job for the neighbor next door and decide to tear some of the wild life, furniture to ease the adrenaline. One wrong step and you’re the next. 

The thing is, Kakashi wasn’t afraid of dying.

“Where were you?” he said, not in his bored, detached tone, but full of brazenness.

“What?” a higher pitch. Mortal feline, pray not noticing boundaries.

“Where were you when Naruto needed you?” the pray catch the eye of the predator and decided to face it. Sometimes, lions think they can abate any mammal they see; what they don't see is that sometimes the mammal can be a gnu and it killed Mufasa, didn't it?

“How dare you–” 

“I bet my lung, kidneys, my fucking whole life you knew how he was." Kakashi stepped on the glass on the floor, shattering it, like teeth crackling, nails that scratch the blackboard. "Everyone knew.” _He is your blood_ , he should've said.

Her brain was screaming, tearing him aparting, but she lost her voice. She wanted to kill him, but he was saving her the trouble and killing them both in one blow.

Every word was true and that hurt her to a deeper level. It was like throwing a bucket of blood to her face a few years ago: it terrified her.

“You just said: you wanted to be a drunk gambler. Where the fuck were you?”

“I am your Hok–”

“My Hokage, yeah, I got that part the day you came into the village.” he bowed, mocking, insane. “It doesn’t take the burden out of your shoulders. Nor Jiraiya’s. Neither from Hiruzen.”

“You can’t call him like that, you twisted fuck ass dick –” 

“I FUCKING CAN! I WAS THE ONE HERE! The one that saw him grow up alone and miserable, the parents never letting their kids even look at him. And the “God of Shinobi”, the Professor, your sensei — he thought you both right, uh, Tsunade?— never let me even talk to the kid. I did it anyway because he was a child and all of you let them all treat him be treated like a monster. You washed your hands and walked away. All of you. You ran –”

His breath was cut short from his lungs.

Tsunade was known for her inhuman strength, for her temperament, drinking habit and gambling addiction. She was showing none of those in that moment. She didn’t punch him through the wall. She didn’t throw a chair or a table at his direction. Her face was flushed and her pigtails were loose, some of her hair sticking to her temple, her breath hasty, her eyes hatched, her anger in tears – her five fingers imprinted in his cheek.

She slapped him across the cheek instead of doing all she usually would do. That meant she wasn’t acid anymore. It would sting and bruise, but it wouldn’t kill. Dying isn’t always a punition. She knew it way too well when her hands were covered in blood, but hearts were no longer bumping it.)

She hit a black spot that hurt like hell, he did the same. They were both in dangerous territory, but she had the upper hand.

His cheek burned like the sun touched it for too long, however he couldn’t help but smile.

“You never ever again dare to talk to me like that, you piece of shit of a brat.” her words were low, but her pupils were dilated and he tasted the tears in her voice. They both knew he was right. She left Naruto.

Even being much shorter her eyes were even with his, honey dripping on still, sweeten much to the point of nauseating.

“You know you can kill me, but it won’t cease to be true.” He could taste the blood on his mouth already. She grabbed him by his shirt and leveled their faces.

“You know nothing, boy.”

Her grip was much too strong and the day wasn’t playing as it should. He never thought he would end up in this position, almost kneeling to be on her eye level after yelling on her face how much she failed of one the purest person he ever crossed paths with and left him to rot in misery. He never thought he’d voice it, much less to face, much less today, much less on Sakura’s behavior.

The day seemed to pass and a whole year seemed to grow while their eyes locked in one another before she let him go – he kept his eyes down and she kept her mouth full. They didn’t move. He grabbed his bottle and finished its content and so did she. They froze in space, minds too far to share. If time really passed they didn’t noticed and they didn’t care. Why be in such a hurry if the destiny is death?

His mouth was dry when he gathered his thoughts and tried for the very last time. He didn’t know why he was still trying. If it was really worth.

“Sakur–” 

“Your father, Hatake.” a cannonball, straight to his guts. The alcohol burned all his organs. “He was something.” shut up. “He would’ve been…” her voice seemed to care affection and longing. Shut up. “But, the sad part is about your... mother” Kakashi’s grip on the bottle made it shatter, but if she heard the glass exploding she didn’t give a fuck as she didn’t turn around. Shut up. “It’s a pity you don’t remember your mother, though. She was much like Sakura.” Shut up, shut it shut it shut it just shut it

“Shut up” was it a whisper or not, he didn’t care anymore. You can’t poke someone with hot iron and not expect them to hiss.

_(In the years, Kakashi's habits had him out of his mind as a coping mechanism. It usually leaded to slaughters, hours or days in a roll he couldn't remember what he did, where or why, it had him hallucinating and he knew that day by day he was putting another pin in the coffin of his mind — but his mouth was dry, he was thirsty and it was too little, too late to stop him. Kakashi was a train wreck, but he wouldn't survive if he didn't. It was the last refuge his mind found for him to escape when it hurt too much. And that's where he was now.)_

The vixen (he was seeing double) turned around, glee and mischief (she was concerned) in her eyes, as if his pain was a parade (no, Kakashi). “What?” her voice was mocking him (she wasn't).²

“Don’t talk about her.”

“Why not?”

“Just don’t.”

“I am trying to explain to you why Sakura can and should go –”

“If that’s your fucking brilliance than you’re just making it all worse.”

She showed her backstory, then. Tsunade slapped her hand so hard in the table it crashed in multiple parts, bringing it all to the floor.

“How the fuck” one step closer “dare you” two steps closer “keep talking to me” three steps closer “like that?” and she was almost in his personal space.

He was snarling.

This was a lost battle and he lost his mind long ago.

“I fucking know how and where she died” one step closer “and you are trying to convince me” two steps closer “that it’s save for Sakura to go and face” into her personal space “the same destiny?”

He was doomed. This is Armageddon.

Kakashi could swear the Slug Princess opened her mouth to speak about his father again and he was pretty sure he was about to yell to her never to talk about him ever again, but her fist met some part of him and the last thing he saw was a trait of blue sky with a gray cloud and soft tears of rain.

* * *

**seven years later**

* * *

_May 3034, 5 years after the beginning of the 4th Great Ninja War_

* * *

"Oi? Hey... You awake?" 

She didn't even flinch. Her breathe was even and her face was peaceful. The night was clear, there almost no clouds in the sky, making it look more of a deep ocean blue than navy blue. 

"Sometimes" he began, speaking no louder than a whisper, not sure if to himself or if to her. He was running his fingers through her hair, just the way she always liked, after she had a long day, after sex, from her first memories of when she was a child and to ease panic attacks and he just liked to run his fingers through her hair ignorant to all the meaning behind it, an unconscious simple that would thank her for all she did for him, for them "about those who are gone. I don't know whom, precisely, I am thinking about, some days. I just think of them. When I was much younger, my father told me that all the stars in the sky were the souls of the ones that died for us. I was sad because so many died, but today, looking outside, they are resting somewhere. But, I don't think about them in a sad way. Well, it is always sad, but you understand."

Actually, she didn't, because she was sleeping. He almost thought he could be losing his mind, talking to someone that wasn't listening. But she was just asleep and not dead, and that was such a development. 

"As a doctor, you know that we bury shallow people. The organs are removed, the fat, everything. They're just" he gestured with his big arms, trying not to move her so much, as she was laying in her bicep and he didn't want to knock anything and scare Hinata that was on watch, sighing because he couldn't find the word that would describe so perfectly to her what the people were. "huge potato sacks empty. They're even all tied up, lines seizing their mouths shut and their chests, sewn. We bury just a shallow vessel of those we love. I didn't know it when I was just a chit, when I buried my mother and my father."

The night was silent, just an owl howling and a dog barking. The boys were sleeping in the living room. He wondered if they could hear him.

"I don't remember my mother's funeral, actually. And I've never found her name at the cemetery to pay her a visit. There are just so many graves there someday I think we will run out of space. Run out of space to bury ours. I can't even — as a Hokage, I could sent them to turn the cemetery upside down to find her, so I could give her a proper goodbye — a proper  _ hello _ . All I remember of her is her hair. It was as soft as yours, but it wasn't pink." He buried his face in his hand. "I guess. I don't remember."

He tried to read, but he didn't want to read about romance and sex — they were at enemy territory and anywhere could be their deathbed. And he didn't want to read Jiraiya's words, as every time he read, a place inside him reminded him there would never be a new edition. Jiraiya was dead. 

Kakashi needed a distraction, but that wasn't it. 

He counted all the freckles Sakura had in her face (twenty tree and that one that looked like a star at the bridge of her nose). He ran for the twentieth time the new Intel they got just a couple hours back and kept making mental notes. He kept checking the place for enemy chakra approaching and that probably was extremely rude to Hinata. Hinata — that saved their lives two days ago. 

They became sloppy. Kakashi was used to fight with numb limbs and so was Sakura, but when it turned out to be 20 against 2 they asked for any God for forgiveness of their sins and launched to their certain death. There was so much  _ fire.  _ Sakura grew to hate fire — how bright it is, how it can locate you from miles away, how it is too hot even when you are freezing, how it takes too long to scar, how it hurts. She hated "The Will of Fire". It was just psychological bullshit for you to die thinking you did something for a greater good. You die smiling, but you didn't save nothing nor anyone. 

Kakashi was throwing and roaring the sky with lightning, ready to finally unleash his triumph card when the  _ Demon Eagle _ , the once shy and stuttering Hinata appeared and the three of them worked in perfect unison. 

When the enemy was dead, they retrieve the Intel and the bitches knew too much — and now, Hinata knew too much, but she didn't react with any kind of shock or surprise, even if it was somehow old news. She just smiled and patted Sakura's cheek and smiled to him. 

_ (Hinata's hair was so long now it hit her rear, but she never tied it. She didn't have a fringe anymore so her sister, Hanabi looked a lot like her now. Hinata was wearing the Anbu gear just as Sakura was before the past days fights ended up fucking all they had for clothes. It was raining the whole time, so it was hard to say when Hinata turned around to look at them, a minimal smile on her face, before putting on her mask, if she was crying or if it was just the rain. _

_ Maybe it is something inherited by Itachi. Let the rain wash away any trait of weaknesses or the rules you are breaking. And only Hinata knew how much Sakura was carrying in her shoulders now, having more blood of another's in her hands and clothes and skin than her own in her system. Sakura was way past traumatised and that, solo, was sad. _

_ And for Sakura, she would cry. She would destroy an army for her, she would bury a country for her, she would build a city for her, she would catch stars with her bare hands. She would begin and end wars for her. _

_ "I will keep watch this night" and she vanished.) _

The rogue ninja had precise intel about how bad their addiction was and how and when they were more vulnerable. The other page was an essay about Minato and Kakashi remembered he was the one that burned that.

He watched as the lights on the outside glisten in her diamond and how much their skin was alike and, yet, completely different. They were both pale, but she looked more healthy, even if she'd lost a couple of pounds in the past years. 

Her cheeks weren't hollow anymore, at least. Neither his. He didn't know for sure. He had already drank the flask he kept in a secret part of the mattress — the one she didn't find of yet. There was still the one he kept at the hole at his backpack, the one no one found, where he kept scrolls, supplies and his drinks. Certain things you hide your best, certain things you just don't give a fuck. 

He still had a report Naruto wrote six years ago about a house arrest he tended with Sakura, Sai and Yamato, the Team 7 recycled. It was pathetic, but he kept it. 

Nevertheless, Sakura and Kakashi, after all those years, they stopped hiding each others drugs. 

When an addict wants something, he will get it, no matter how much you try to hide it or if you tie them to the bed. Addiction acts on itself. You're not you anymore. 

They had their really, really bad days. They sell objects of the house, clothes, jewelry , books, even committed burglary. Three months ago, they decided they would do it. 

_ Stop. _

It is the strongest word in the world.

And by stopping, they would have to go through detoxification.

It is the process of letting the body remove the drugs in it. The purpose is to safely manage withdrawal symptoms when someone stops taking substances of all kinds. It often includes medications that mimic the effects to reduce withdrawal symptoms. Medications may also target co-occurring disorders or general discomfort.

Detox can be dangerous, so amedically assisted detox can reduce withdrawal symptoms and ensure safety. Shit is when the medic is the one going through the detox process. Sakura couldn't act as a doctor to herself, regulating and monitoring her conditions. She could take care of Kakashi, she  _ would _ take care of Kakashi, but —

When the substances are gradually reduced and removed, the brain will have to adjust to the sudden drop in these chemicals. It can take days or months to get through. 

The length of withdrawal depends on a number of factors, including type of substance the user is addicted to, duration an addiction has lasted, the severity of the addiction, the amount of a substance the user takes at one time, underlying mental health conditions. They filled all the conditions and badly. They were royalty fucked up. Their recovery would take  _ months. _ They've been abusing for three years minimal (Kakashi lost the account of years; maybe ten). The symptoms of detox were nervousness or anxiety, insomnia, nausea, body discomfort, mood swings, poor sleep and difficulty concentrating. 

It involves managing initial cravings and anxiety. But alcohol withdrawal includes physical symptoms that can cause seizures or death in some cases. 

In rapid detox, which was what they needed, the addicted person is sedated with anesthesia and given medications that replace the drugs in the body. The risks of rapid detox often outweigh the benefits. Heart attack, paranoia, high body temperature, infection, nausea, vomiting, aspiration, choking,  _ death _ .

They had no choice. 

Either they'd die trying to stop or they'd die fighting. What would be worse: die fighting for yourself or fighting for your people? The logical answer would be the first one, but they were suicidal martyrs, bathed in selflessness. They would go down with blood on their hands and necks, not with dry vomit on their chins — they hoped so.

The pain was too much. They knew what they were doing. Knew the shit hole they dig themselves in and escaping now was a distant dream. As long as they could fight, their snacking hands and doubled vision, slurred words and dilated pupils, were there to serve their purpose. If your life has no meaning, is the same as being dead, and, for them, lock themselves to emerge sane and clean while the world went down was stepping in their life purpose and they'd be better dead. 

Truth was they didn't have  _ time _ . Detoxification takes months. They didn't have it. They were needed, every day, every time. Their were losing numbers and they couldn't send kids to the war — even though they were. Every time Kakashi came across a child's body, he took his time to give it a proper burial. He always tried his best to never let Sakura see them. She cried, when she thought no one was seeing.

Biscuit just had puppies. Kakashi tried to order him to stay at home with his pups, but he denied. Not even a direct order changed his mind. There babies being born. Hinata had her small son — and she was in the frontlines. Sakura spent months arguing with her, but the child looked so much like Naruto that defending him was the biggest and better ode she could give him. 

Every time they managed to visit the boy, it was like seeing Naruto and it was a pang to great in their chest and they couldn't even begin to blame Hinata for that.

"It is fucked up. How we cry over people that aren't there anymore. They are just a vessel. A vessel that holds what we once loved. So that's what we bury and raise stones for. For nothing. For no one. Once, when I was Hokage and I was drunk, I thought about just blowing up the Memorial Stone. Genma found me at time. He also punched me oblivious. The next morning, I puked three times consecutive and cut myself with pieces of the box I broke when I fell. It didn't help shit to make me feel less off an ass, a stupid, selfish ass."

The Summer Festival was arriving. Probably. The last Festival was bombarded and the previous one served, for both sides, as a kidnapping session, so they weren't sure if they would go on with this on. Maybe change the date and mislead outsiders. Maybe just don't do anything. Maybe blow the Sun. Maybe, maybe. These days were all about maybe. And, even this, was the best they had. 

According to their data Kakuzu had two hearts again after almost an year into hiding and losing both arms  _ again  _ wasn't stopping Deidara on blowing shit up, even though his fight with Kakashi all those years ago left him in such a bad shape he only survived because Orochimaru helped him. Konan was now dead. She became their allie and her death was bearing its weight. Hidan — well, the fucker was immortal, but they fucking lost track of him again. 

Ay was furious beyond repair and Onoki would die within weeks. Not even Sakura could save him. Mei turned against them — again and left a pretty nasty scar on both Sakura and Naruto as doing so. Ao betrayed her and came to the village, and this time there was no way to tell if she was going to change her mind. Gaara was their savior and they owned him so much they would happily concede half of the Fire Nation to the boy. For five years, he endured and even had to go into run, but he was the best person Naruto could've found in the world in so many senses. 

Kakashi would bow to his loyalty to his dying day and would do it with pleasure. 

So much more was still going on. Yet, all their data could be wrong, as it's been so many times. They had everything and nothing at the same time.

That's why they dispersed in four groups, leaving Minato solo. Tsunade went with Yamato to the border of the Grass, Temari and Tobirama went to the west of the Rock, Ino and Shikamaru to the Sand and Minato to the Mist, leaving Kakashi and Sakura to the Rain, awhile Hinata was travelling with Tenten that was now a sealing jutsu master that rivaled Naruto. They were few to cover so much ground, so they kept switching. Kakashi's next partner would be Ino, while Sakura's would be Tobirama's and Temari would've been already dropped to Shisui, that was solo. Gaara was acting where he could, as much as he could. But they all knew that at the moment Onoki died, it would burst sky high and then, hell would break loose and there would be no stopping until they all drowned in blood.

No shit he couldn't sleep.

The old apartment they found was in enemy territory, but they manage to hide it well with genjutsu and set enough traps to turn it into a medieval castle with its crocodiles. Unfortunately, they couldn't stay for much longer. It was a small place, half blown, half still. The kitchen didn't exist anymore, so they had to deal with fresh food and cook using fires. The bathroom was enough for them to clean themselves, but there was no hot water and they were deep in the Rain in the middle of the winter. Sakura had to take all prevent methods for them not get any disease in the trashed place or catch a cold — at this pace, colds kill. 

She shivered and he hold her thigher. Their clothes were torn and the spares were still drying, if they had any luck. Tobirama and Temari were supposed to meet them in four days to check another suspect shit. The last one turned to be lava. Things were getting worse and he missed the Leaf everyday with all his being, but there was nothing he could do  _ now. _ Not after what happened. 

Bull farted at the living room and Pakkun called him so many names, Ikibi was competing — until Hahab told them to shut the fuck up. No doubt he was Sakura's favourite. They were so much alike he was surprise he wasn't her originally. 

"I couldn't stand burying you, Sakura." His voice sounded strained and he felt what could be the beginning of tears. He didn't shake them off.  _ 'Shinobi don't cry', _ he once told Obito, he once told so many people, a lifetime ago. But they do.

And for Sakura, he would cry. He would destroy an army for her, he would bury a country for her, he would build a city for her, he would catch stars with his bare hands. He would begin and end wars for her. "I couldn't —  _ fuck  _ — not you too, not again."

The owl cried into the night and some dogs howled, the moon full. The sky was starting to lighten up and they would have to leave in three days. 

He didn't want to. He wanted to hide himself, and her, mostly her, from the world. Find some island and live in a cave, eat coconuts and fish big fishes. They could even live naked. They could disappear. 

But they wouldn't. Cause where there's smoke, there is fire. And they  _ were _ fire. They were born of it and would die of it. 

"I love you." 

_ I love you  _

The three words everyone is so afraid to speak were said at the end of the night for no one to hear it or catch it. 

Someone said, was it Kakashi, Sakura or Hinata, it was already impossible to tell. 

Who has place for love in the shinobi world? — was what Hinata was thinking when she jumped of the window, three men 37 km from them. Love is also destruction to construct. 

He kissed her forehead and finally drifted off.

_ Love is less terrifying than life _ .

A fat tear was rolling out of her eye.

She wasn't asleep.


	5. Dysrhythmia

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Forgive the typos. I am no a dumb bitch, I am just a lonely bitch that has no beta. I try to fix it the best I manage to by myself.  
> This chapter has a lot of angst, but it was heavenly necessary to the history and there is only one more angst scene I've written, so we're pretty much done. And there's a whole scene about suicide, but I tried to come out with it the less triggery way as possible, but suicide is so recurrent in Naruto (Sakumo, Shisui, Deidara, Rin, Yahiko, etc) and I HAD to talk about it.  
> But, well, I've come to terms to the fact I am probably writing this fanfic for myself, but if there is someone out there, just wanted to say that :)  
> enjoy!

_May 3031, 2 years after the beginning of the 4th Great Ninja War_

* * *

"Kakashi, this is the last time." 

"You say that every time, but you always come back." 

"I am not coming back this time. This shouldn't happen." 

"Maybe not, but it did and it does and is it really that bad?" 

"It is the last time." 

"You always come back, Sakura. You know that." 

"Not anymore. I won't do this anymore. This isn't... we shouldn't have ever begun with this, at first place." 

"But we did and the harm is already done." 

"Kakashi." She sighed. "I am not coming back. I am final." 

"Why? Sakura, come one. It... it isn't bad. You know it." 

"Isn't it?" 

"I know and I am — hum, actually, I'm not really sorry, but if I say I am would make you feel better?" 

"No, it wouldn't. And no —" She put her finger over his masked lips, a hard look in her eyes. "It wouldn't change my mind either.” Sakura took a deep breath, closing her eyes and pinching the bridge of her nose. "This is my fault. I shouldn't have done it in the first place" 

"Ei," Kakashi reached for her hand and squeezed it, his eyes creasing on a true smile beneath and it was warm as the sun bathing them in the early morning. "I convinced you. If there's anyone to blame, it would be me. But you did it 'cause you care about me and that's why you always come back." 

She finally gave him half smile, half smirk, but her voice sounded much less grump then she intended. 

"Jerk."

He smiled brighter. 

Those smiles were so rare that she didn't wanna miss a single second of it. Maybe it was worthy, after all. Maybe. 

"But it's true!" She knew that even beneath the mask there was a bloody smirk, full of smugness and she rolled her eyes because she wasn't to lose her battle just because he was _smiling._

"You always tell people you manipulated them into something?" 

"Sometimes." 

"Cocky smartass." 

He shrugged. "What can I do if my charms are irresistible?" 

"Yep, that's it. I'm not coming back." 

"Sakura, come on. It isn't that bad. It isn't wrong. You know that." 

"But you are literally using me!" 

"No, I am not. I would never. I just directed you here." 

"Kakashi, I mean it. I am not doing this any more" 

"Sakura- _a_ " he sang, the bastard "You know how much I hate hospitals." 

"Then you should be more careful." 

"Hm, ninja?" He pointed at himself as he was (as always) explaining something to a five year kid. A dumb five year kid. 

"I really hate when you use that tone" 

"Which tone?" Kakashi asked in all the innocence in the world. Sakura just rolled her eyes 

"Your days with a private doctor are over, Hatake." 

"You still didn't tell me which tone." He had those puppy eyes and she didn't know if the pack taught him that or if it was the other way round. 

"The “I am trying to explain something obvious to a dumb piece of shit of a human being”." "That's harsh. How can you accuse your sensei of treating you like that?" 

"You get off in annoying me." She stood up from the tip of his bed and started to pack her medi kit. "And, as a punishment, you will do your physicals in the hospital next time." 

"Sakura!" He stood up as well, too fast 'cause he hissed in pain. "Don't be so mean. I won't do my physicals ever again if I have to go _a-a_ ll" he stretched the word begging "the way there." He really looked like a puppy. "And why am I still in pain?" 

"You live closer to the hospital than me!" She yelled from over her shoulder, washing her hands in the bathroom sink. 

_(One day her heart wouldn't threat to choke her every time she saw that amount of blood over him. She couldn't break down. It was not an option.)_

"And you came back in a really fucked up condition. I can't take the pain away and you should know that by now." He knew she should've been giving him the look now. "As I told you a thousand times." 

"See?, that's another reason for you to come back." He just plain ignored what she said. The voice of her wiping her hands in the towel became louder. "You don't have to go _aaa_ ll the way to the hospital. You can just stop and check on me! It is a clear win/win situation." 

"I am not coming back." Sakura said leaning on the door, her stained blouse hanging on her arm that was crossed in front of her chest. 

"Yes, you are." He said, barely audible, a cocky tone in his smug smile. 

She stepped into the room, her hair falling into her face hardly from the braid 

"What did you say?" 

"Nothing." He threw himself back again in the bed, stretching (a low hiss of pain), a hand under his head, his ankles crossed and opened Make Out however-volume-it-was. 

"Do you really have to read your porn while I am still here?" 

"It is not porn." 

"Yes, it is." 

"Nope." 

"You're such an idiot." 

Sakura shook her head and walked away, tossing her blouse into his face. He almost choke on that. A smile crossed her face. It was supposed to be a grim, but it only came out affectionate. 

"What is wrong with reading a masterpiece while your friend is roasting you and threatening you to die alone in his apartment?" He shouted seeming truly hurt. 

"God. How do I manage to have so much patience with you?" 

"You don't really have a lot of patience. You punch me and then heal me. You punch really hard, did I ever tell you that? An old man like me could die." 

“Thought you said just last week you weren’t out when Genma tried to beat you at a drink contest.”

She rolled her eyes again and went straight to the kitchen, leaving her bag in the counter.

“And did he beat me?” He sounded like was rolling to be at his stomach, to read like a teenager. Old man her ass, indeend. 

“Score.” 

She could hear his laugh coming from the other room and all that bullshit she pulled through was worthy. How many _years_ that man was left there, at this very apartment, only with his pack, laughing at nothing but Jiraya’s books only to his laugh die seconds later when he realised how alone he was? 

_(Sakura would never know how many times he laid there at night, at the very kitchen floor, unable to be at his feet to make it to the bathroom, the whole spinning and he was sick of feeling sick for the tenth time in the night. He considered not turning to the side the next time another wave of nausea came and just choke in his vomit._

_Bull turned him to the side and he didn’t choke._

_He wish he did.)_

Sakura would pull through his attitude any day, any time, for how long it was necessary if that meant he would be better. Even if it was at her expense.

Taking a melodramatic, too high sight. “But I am too young to die for the hands of your fridge, Hatake.”

“Fridges don’t have hands, dear Sakura.”

She breathed out _fuck you_ and entered the kitchen. The fridge didn’t have hands, but it really competed with Naruto’s. As a medic and a normal human being, she didn’t know how they were alive. And they kept the stupid bullshit about her soldier pills. 

Ungrateful radioactive ninjas. 

She leaned in front of the fridge and decided to open it, hoping it wasn’t _that_ bad. 

"Ok, you bitch, what are we gonna have for lunch today?" She said while inspecting his fridge in record time and closed it within two seconds, covering her nose. “Holy Baby Jesus on a stick.” It was worse than she thought. She yelled over the porch. “How are you still alive? There's food that's been here before I was even born." (She ignored how many bottles were there and how they were the only thing organized.)

"That's not true!" He shouted evenly from the bedroom and she could see his sensei finger correcting her. "I had to buy a new fridge after the last time you tried to punch me and I dodged - so you murdered” she rolled her eyes so hard she thought they would never come back. “cold blooded my fridge. And the wall. And my bathroom sink." 

"Your bathroom sink?” She shrieked. “I broke your bathroom sink because I broke the fridge?" She was already at the cabinets, looking for something in the expiration date or not canned beans because she had the theory that after a while your body simply rejects the canned beans the moment it sees it. “We” _we_ “have to fix this cabinets. I swear to God this whole place is just going to fall over your head when you walk through the door.”

"Yep. When you shattered my beloved kitchen wall and you made a lot of dust and cement fall all over my sink." His voice was between undisturbed and humorous. “And I only come through the window.”

Of course he only came through the window. 

_(The flip of pages was background noise, which is something he never thought he’d experience in his own house. Walking down the street, teaching those diabolical things and even at small fights, the rest was background noise, not his book. But with Sakura teasing him about his fridge and wanting to fix things to make it more comfortable for it, it was something he thought he’d die without it._

_He was used to laugh among Jiraya and himself, the boys at his feet, a bottle or another. Those laughs die painfully in your chest when they echo in the empty room and you choke back on tears that don’t fall has been years. Depression, despite what people say, don’t hit you in the face like a brick straight in the face only 2 AM when you’re alone thinking too much. It hit him harder so many times when he laughed to himself in the middle of the village and he looked up and realised all those people, all those lives he saved didn’t need him. In his group of friends he could leave, turn into shadows and no one would notice. That’s what he did the whole time. So the flip of pages was louder than anything else, but now it was background noise.)_

"You're saying I ruined your sink because dust fell over it? _Dust,_ Kakashi? Gaara would be hurt.” She prayed he never tell Gaara she compared sand and dust. He would forever tease her about that. “And you need new glasses and dishes ‘n shit like that. These are probably The First’s Era - or even before." 

"Gaara’s _dust_ ” The fucker said “and probably half of the content in the fridge, all splashed over my poor sink. And if they that old, aren’t they relics and untouchable and holy?" 

"Kakashi," She turned around and leaned on the kitchen sink, making mental notes to buy new dishes. "all the content on that fridge could've been radioactive, but since, as you say, I shattered the thing, I probably saved your bathroom cause you were obliged to reform it.” She crouched to look at the lower cabinets. “And no, they’re not holy. It seems rats moved nests around here." 

"Do you know how expensive it was to fix a fridge, a wall and a bathroom? All of them with poisoned radioactive food?" His voice was aiming into deadpan, but he was failing so bad, because she could almost taste the smile in it. She smiled back to the cobwebs decorating the cupboard.

"I do know, cause I was the one that paid for the reform!" 

"But the landlord yelled at me only for almost ruining the building and killing everyone inside 'cause the walls fell due the impact of this beautifully mortal small hand." 

"Are you trying to flatter me by complimenting my hands?" She looked at her hands, turning it around and gave them a proud look. 

"You're checking your hands right now, aren't you?" 

"Wa - how did you know?" 

"I was bluffing." 

"Smartass." She said under her breath, her head almost inside the cupboard trying to see if there was _anything_ worth saving. (There wasn’t.)

"I heard it." He sang.

"What, how- ". She got to her feet, cleaning her hands on her pants, dust rising in the air. "And the landlord yelled at me 'cause you vanished as soon as you heard footsteps. And get out of the fucking bed, already. You’re helping me with - whatever we’re gonna do for lunch." 

She was pouring glasses of water to both of them, eyeing the sake and wondering if it was really that early to drink. She had a rough week and it was past miday already.

"Well, you see, there was a poor pigeon being harassed by an evil fat cat and I had-" 

"Yeah, yeah. Any of your excuses involves something else not animals?" 

"Well, next time I can say I was late 'cause I was having a nice rough sex and lost tracking of time." 

Sakura choked on the water she was drinking in a small glass she was sure one was home of some pickles. A second later he was leaving on the kitchen door, the book open in his hands, but he was staring at her with a devilish grin. 

She didn't need to see his face to know he was giving the "flirting look" that made everyone turn into pool. A look that said explicitly _you_ and would always cause shivers on the spine of those caught on surprise.

Sakura was way too used to that look. She knew how to use hers — even though Kakashi was much, much better, the fucker. Kunoichi learn to pick flowers, throw shuriken, never be stronger than boys and _seduce_. Yeah, they teach that shit in school.

She saw him giving that look dozens of times. Was it to seduce/convince a client, an enemy, anyone to fall over his feet and give them whatever they needed; was it to pick girls at bars; was it to her in infiltration mission. 

_(There was a particular infiltration mission that was standard protocol. They didn’t had to pose much as husband and wife, share the bed, fall in love. But he gave her that look. He hold on more time than it was necessary and Sakura understood there why it was all that women and men fell. She felt the urge to laugh, but it would ruin the disguise.They were as close as two bodies can be, inside a broom closet, just for the cliche, his eyes so deep into hers and hers drinking out of him. The warmth of his body was what kept the temperature of hers rising, like a fever that gives you hallucinations, but you (should) get off of it, you (supposedly) don’t take the cold shower —Sakura couldn't move. She couldn't take the cold shower. The temperature was rising. Rising too much. It was afire._

_She_

_was_

_going_

_to_

_fucking_

_die_

_It was Kakashi, she knew it was him, that his hand wouldn't waver or she wouldn't feel him against her thigh, but her heart was beating too fast. She wanted to explode the closet and burn from inside out just for it to cease._

_She hadn't been close another man ever since —_

_So, she did what she did best: deflect._

_Sakura asked herself if she was attracted to him. Sakura asked herself if she was attracted to men because she didn't give much thought — she just had an obsession over Sasuke and casual sex. Sakura remembered all the porn she read and asked if she wanted to:_

_"pull him even more closer, to taste him,_

_in the first two seconds, her reverie lost Kakashi's form — or didn't. Sakura had already her pills. She was just straight porn thinking in the middle of the mission_

_"run her hands over every part of that body she could manage. Slam the person into a wall and left traces with her nails, claiming, feeling under her clutch all she could take from him. Rip him apart, to destroy him, to leave no traces behind. Taste every swell of tongue and skin, bath on sweat and raw flesh. Knees get weak, tear you apart. Shred any trait of clothes and admire the sight with her bare hands."_

_At the end of the fantasy she knew she_ wanted to _, but not necessarily with Kakashi or with a man or with a woman._

_Remembering all the porn movies, she saw:_

_them (man, woman, Kakashi, that guy in the library, that girl from the pub, is she straight?) moving towards each other. Saw that any surface, the walls, trees, tables, snow, would be enough for that. There would be no dirt, guilty feeling afterwards. It would all be washed in tremors of hands and rolls of eyes._

_But the Black Ops crashed the door and finished the mission._

_Fucking ANBU)_

She handed him another glass of water — probably once a small eggs' home. 

"You look sexy like that, ya know?" 

This time it was Kakashi that choked on the water and was shaken by harsh coughs. Openly laughing Sakura patted him in the back to help the swallowing process and just for the sake of hitting him. 

"Ok, ok, thank you, you are kind of cutting my reserves of oxygen, thank you." 

"I can't cut your oxygen by patting you in the back." 

"You were trying.” He coughed once more, his hand on his chest as if he was just saved from being drowned. Typical. “You were spanking my back. I swear to God I've fallen in floors that hurt less." 

"Where did you learn how to be so dramatic?"

“They used to have classes about it in the Academy?”

“Oh, during the War?”

He just gave her the middle finger. She just laughed going back to the oven, deciding that the eggs in his fridge wouldn't kill them. If they were that bad, she was still a medic and she could save their lives. Although it was no surprise he had the equivalent of the fuck's he give to everything in life in his cabinets for temperos, she tried her luck. 

Kakashi cleared his throat, trying to regain her attention, looking at her dead in the eye, brows furrowing and eyes narrowing at her, putting on his best scary stare. Sakura just lifted an eyebrow looking at him over her shoulder while she was busy toasting bread (she hoped that was actual bread, but it looked okay enough) and cracking eggs. 

She hold back the stare and started to giggle. At first he was as impassive as a door, but slowly he laughed a little and she knew his eye crease was sincere. 

"Didn't know you could get embarrassed by such a silly thing." 

"I wasn't embarrassed, I was shocked and I thought you didn't have in you the good taste to notice how incredibly handsome I am." Kakashi stated leaning on the kitchen counter.

"All the handsomeness left any room to ego control?" 

Even with her back to him, he knew she was rolling her eyes.

"Nope, not even a single bit." 

Sakura laughed again shaking her head. 

"You are impossible." was her favourite line.

"So I heard almost everyday from a marvellous, incredibly beautiful, unbelievable pretty, sexy —" she threw a wet towel at him "and hot" she threw a small empty sugar pot "ninja from the Sand." he finished the sentence in the best of his teasing voice.

This time she threw the toaster — that was still on and smacked some place into his living room. 

"Oh, a ninja from the Sand, uh? Let's hope she doesn't have any poison on her fighting arsenal. Or sand murder as Gaara's. Or wind that can cut you in two." 

"You're really mean." 

Sakura shrugged and turned to the oven. 

"Hey, I was just teasing. You wouldn't let me put "hot" and "sexy" in a sentence that involves you." 

Sakura felt the floor beneath her feet popple and closing her eyes would bring all the memories back — but the words still hurt.

"I wouldn't let it 'cause you wouldn't fucking mean it, Ka-ka-shi and my — my —" my very fucking raped core can't deal with faking flirting right now unless I kill you "self esteem is really fucked up right now, I am tired of this little stupid games, so _thank you very much_." every word of hers was punctured with a stab with the fork in the frying eggs.

"Sakura," Kakashi said easily, she didn't look at him. "Sakura," he repeated with something almost sweet in his voice. Almost. "Sakura, look at me." 

She turned around and he could see the phantom of tears in her eyes even if she held her head high. "Sakura, you are going to make a hole in the oven if you keep torturing the eggs like that." 

Tsunade passed on a ferocity to her apprentice, that glowed pale blue in Sakura, being able to taste her chakra when she was mad — and she became furious. Sakura turned around and shut the fire off (actually, she just lowered the fire to its minimum), storming to the living room, grabbing her spare medical kit on the way not caring that she forgot _her_ bagband was just taking the med kit. Kakashi stood in front of her, at the free expense of losing his limbs.

"Woah, calm down. I was kidding." Kakashi gave her his signature eye crinkle, rubbing the back of his neck. 

Sakura was staring at the floor trying to burn holes in his carpet since she had to stop stabbing the eggs. Her stomach didn't know what to do to: feel threaten or angry? Rip him apart or punch him? Run and hide or crack his door in the way out?

"I was joking, ok? You really wouldn't like a compliment like that 'cause I know you value way more your hard work and achievements over something vain as looks." he put both of his hands in her shoulders and didn't miss the way she flinched — his eyes grew darker in understanding, but the light came instantly making it look like stormy clouds and not the eye of a tornado — and almost crouched in front of her, taking one step back, and just ghosting his hands over her shoulder, lightly, to meet her eyesight. "Don't take it so hard on yourself." he lifted her chin with the tip of the right finger of his hand, observing her reaction, while the other hand was still in her shoulder, light as a feather. "Come on, look at me, I think I will have cramps forever if I have to crouch in front of you for you to look at me." 

Kakashi knew.

"What a pity it would be." she said bitterly, still not looking at him 

"Well, it wouldn't be so bad. I know a medic nin that, man, she is the very best in her field and she would probably punch the cramp out of me." 

Sakura gave a small laugh and looked at him. 

"I can't really punch cramps away, but I would be willing to try." 

"Well, the next time I upset you I will let you try." 

"You wouldn't go that far just to make me feel good." 

Kakashi knew.

Sakura was raped. 

"Yes, I would. I would go lengths you can’t imagine for you to feel good." 

With that, silence made itself at home and they just stood that staring at each other. 

It was funny how everything unravelled the last few years. The bonds that were created between people, even when the alliance broke. But it turned out to be dangerous the past few months. Everywhere was enemy territory. Every time you set foot on the road, you had to be on guard, because people were dying like flies. The number of casualties was hard to keep. 

Sakura's mask was pressing in her hip between herself and the door and it reminded her of the truth of the world outside: while they were joking and teasing each other, some seven year old child was dying, leaving his mother at home to wait for a son that would never return. She sighed and Kakashi gave her an understanding smile. It was crazy how much she learnt to read even with his mask on.

"I wonder where is Naruto."

"Wanna punch him?"

She just rolled her eyes.

"No, you twat. He just should've returned. His idiotic infiltration at Stone was… idiotic."

"He wouldn't let anyone take his place, Sakura. A is a personal matter now."

Oh, yeah, A. That man was a fucking nightmare. She was the one that was able to rip two more fingers off his hands almost two years ago when he turned around to kill Ino — and when Killer Bee turned his back against his own brother. He was now into protection, near the Uzumaki shrine.

Everything was out of place ever since Naruto left almost five months ago. Ao betrayed Mei and came to their side. She went on a rampage and almost destroyed the Village. Having me I as an ally is good thing; as an enemy is a fucking nightmare. And now Naruto was trying to clean the mess from the outside and they were trying to clean it from the inside. Sakura knew she would be the next one to leave as soon as Shizune returned. She was in the same platoon as Naruto's, even though hers followed East and Naruto kept on North. 

Shizune had to pick medicinal herbs — that's was on her scroll. She was gone to assassinate a diplomat and collect the poison of an almost extinguished clan that lived secluded in the mountains. They were being accused of siding with Madara in the War. Not even Kakashi gave her the details. 

They were at a very delicate time that could solve the entire War. As soon as Shizune and Naruto planted their feet inside the gates, they would analyse the outcome of their missions and run the possible strategies and propose a deal.

Madara was still out there. It seemed he would always be out there, now.

The attacks didn't cease and were harder and harder to predict. When they were convinced they were random, they found the pattern; when they found the pattern, it would go back to follow its own gourd. It was impossible to be a 100% prepared. They covered all the fronts, keeping their highest shinobi always near, but they kept leaving in missions, never being able just to stay patrolling the borders and case scenarios like Naruto being gone happened just as well as Tobirama, Sakura, Tsunade, Hinata, Minato, Shikamaru, Kakashi himself and the list goes on. They didn't have the luxury to sit down and let the others do the dirty job.

Some places were better than others, some were at peace and some would be randomly attacked and they would lose many. That was their life now. 

"When you Minato come back? It is fucking terrible when both of them are gone.

And it was indeed. They controlled Kurama's chakra, so they were essential when enemies attacked, being their strongest weapon. They almost never went on mission simultaneously. 

Shit was going down the hole.

If they just killed the fucker from that clan — Tsunade had a particular distaste for them — maybe a peace offering would be considerable and they could ally again against Madara. They were all doomed if they kept fighting among themselves. 

Sakura looked around Kakashi's apartment and couldn't contain the smile when she took the view in: his minuscule bachelor apartment wasn't _his_ for quite a while. Now, they all gathered there even if it was too crowded. It was the place to get smashed, tell was stories, be their own princes in white horses, gamble all night, sing out tune, to get caught in the smoke of Shikamaru's smoke and Kakashi's cigarette, until you finally admit you smoke too — _forget._ Nicotine calms you down and you don't give a fuck anymore. After awhile, you are fucking your friends in the bathroom.

It happens. 

(Your brain is fried and you're looking down at your feet, seeing all the blood pooled around you, questioning how are you still alive. You cry but it feels dry and hurts your throat. You're alive to die again. The next moment you are fucking against a tree. When it is over, no one will call you back or ask for a date — even if you are _that good_ of a fuck (sometimes of happens, and how deny it? A glass of water and a good fucking you deny nobody). It was adrenaline and the praise for being alive. You laugh out of despair. Sometimes you kiss, but mostly you don't — if you do, is to devour others, just as life is. Some people fall in love fall in love, but most don't. It is a good exercise to get to know your comrades. And to know how crude life is. 

No one talks about it, though. A great part probably don't remember as they were drunk, high or just rather pretend they don't — and at some point everyone is okay with it. 

They don't talk about it, because if you don't it is like it never happened. 

What happened in the battlefield remains in the battlefield.)

"Sasuke."

Sakura turned around so abruptly she hit herself in the face with her own face. 

"What?!"

Did he knew she was thinking about people fucking each other in the battle field — and one (thrice) in the tent they shared. 

"Sasuke." Was all the man said, as always. If someone was to right a play about Kakashi, that focus on dialogue, that shit would have fucking 8 pages, if they were fucking lucky. 

"Sasuke?!"

Sasuke was filling his tea with his canteen, which she smashed with some lion, paperclip, candle.

"Sasuke what, fuck?"

And one about rage control wouldn't feat Sakura not even as the girl that typed the words. 

"Sasuke tried to kiss me once."

"Sasuke _did what?_ "

Signing, Kakashi just went back to the kitchen to poke the tried eggs he had extinguished earlier, but they already black circles with brown centers. That's sad. It was all he head. 

"When I was training him for the Chunnin Exams."

Sakura felt her eyes would pop out her eyebrows ar any moment. 

"And what did you do?"

"Kissed him back." He turned back at her, and his eyes never seemed that hard and intended when directed at her. "I think I dislocated his shoulder when I pushed him." He sighed again, running his hand through his face. "I never had the courage to ask him why he did that."

"Well," Sakura was standing beside him, looking sully at the red, trying to over the shim. "he never seemed to to have any feelings for you." She shrugged. "Then again, he never seemed to have feelings at all — not deep ones, beside revenge and obsession with power."

"Sometimes I think he was trying to validate his existence. He never had feelings for me, that's for sure." Kakashi threw the egg in the trash bin.

"How so?"

Kakashi shrugged slowly, not turning back to face her, still holding the frying pan. "I don't know. Trying to prove something to himself, trying to be important, necessary, carry a secret, to leave a mark, to find a place in the world."

"You think… Sasuke was… gay?"

He turned around, blank and crowing at the same time. 

"No. Not really. He is more an ameba. But he was a 13 year old alone, angry and confused and I managed to push him away even more."

"Kashi," Sakura Walker over him and put the frying pan in the kitchen sink, sitting on its clean and dry part "you can't kiss 13 year old boys so they can feel less lonely.

Kakashi rolled his eyes and leaned into the kitchen table, now eye-to-eye with Sakura.

"I know that." His oh so bored tone informed her. "I just — I should've done something for him, just as should've dor it. Both of them, I was too late. Always too late. For Sasuke, it's the least I could."

Sakura frowned. Kakashi was worse than a rock. Rocks cracked with her fists. 

When she opened her open, she beat her to it. 

"Your eyes look like Christmas lights."

It was supposed to be a joke, but no one was laughing. 

The knocks became bangs in the door that threatened the wood to split. There were only four ninjas in that village with this strength: Sakura, Tsunade, Guy and Lee. When they read the chakra signature, Sakura thought she would faint. Tsunade herself was knocking on the door. 

He opened and the woman looked inside, her true age in her shoulders and a gaze of nothing but pain. Tsunade looked past him and stared at Sakura. 

"You weren't at your apartment, so I knew the only place you could've been was here." she clarified, her voice week. 

It didn't sound like Tsunade at all. She was broken. Broken right in front of them. Broken, showing them that side she never showed anyone. Even Sakura haven't seen her so haggard. 

"Shisou." Sakura started with a small voice, taking a step further in the direction of the door. 

Whatever Tsunade was about to say wasn't good. It was bad. Sakura went closer to Kakashi without even realising. In her unconscious she knew she would need him for support. He was always there to catch her when she falls. She could feel she was about to fall hard when she felt his chest on her back, both of them moved without realizing. 

"Shisou." Sakura tried again. She was terrified. It had to be something big if the woman herself was there to deliver the news. "What happened? Why are you here? What — what happened?" She plead. 

Once Tsunade said it, she wished she hadn't. She wished it was a terrible nightmare or a cruel prank or a dark ridiculous joke. She wished Tsunade didn't said it. She wished she was dead. 

Tsunade took a sigh and said the words that would haunt Sakura to her dying day. 

The Fifth Hokage said: "Sakura, it’s about Shizune.” Sakura’s blood ran cold. No. No. Things were too bad already, she couldn't deal with losing Shizune. “ _and your mother.”_ — the rest was white noise.

* * *

**three years later**

* * *

_December 3035, 5 years after the beginning of the 4th Great Ninja War_

* * *

Kakashi was out of sake. That was his first thought as he woke up in the couch. His back hurt and his eyes burned, red sea and a grey stone sitting at the middle. He rubbed them, trying to rush the sleepiness away. Looking around his room he made a decision: it looked like shit. He, then made another: he was going to arrange some poor Gennin on a D class mission to fix his apartment. 

(He wished with all his might he could keep in giving everyone D rank missions. Even the elite shinobi. Go hunt cats and pick up fences, clean the Memorial Stone, fix the chairs he broke in the bar he went last night. But the truth was the was going to sent this Gennin to clean up his apartment and then to go to the perimeter to get used to it, then small retrieve mission, then bigger, then to the battlefield. He was sacrificing children. They were. Again. It is a endless cycle and he hated himself with every single drop of himself for it. He tried to give them the best of training before they left, designing ANBU that were resting to take off strength and good will out of their asses to help those children. Not even once an ANBU said no. Not because it was an order, but because they knew what it was to die at 12. From the moment they were released from the hospital they picked up as much brats they could and did all they could to train them. There wasn't room for impatience or disliking kids anymore. Either you save lives or you stain your hands and tell their families you could've done something and didn't.) 

Running a hand over his face, feeling all the traits of his scar, he sat down to a flask on his fist. He ain't been sober since maybe October of last year. 

Looking all out of the window he wondered what would happen if he vanished for a while. The day was way too hot and he was already late. Really late. Considerably late. The elders bothered him to no end for what seemed months and months - it had been only six days - for a meeting. 

A meeting at 8 A.M. 

Really? 

It was 11:37 A.M. 

Who were they taking him for? 

a genius 

_gen · ius /_ ˈ _Jēnyəs /_

_noun_

_1._ _exceptional intellectual or creative power or other natural ability._

_Similar: brilliance; great intelligence; great intellect; great ability; cleverness; brains; erudition; wisdom; sagacity; fine mind; wit; artistry; flair; creative power; precocity; precociousness; talent; gift; aptitude; facility; expertise capacity power faculty endowment strength strong point strong dexterity adroitness skill virtuosity_

_Opposite: stupidity_

  1. _a person who is exceptionally intelligent or creative, either generally or in some particular_ _respect._



This word followed him his whole life, even when he failed everyone, everything. Even when he was called _Friend-Killer kakashi, Cold-Blooded Kakashi,_ even then, even _thence_. Kakashi Hatake, the prodigy, the genius. 

Where was that boy, that man now? He was sitting in his own vomit, at the feet of his students, whom he failed, with his best friend anchored, his death eminent. 

(a _nd that was just the_ be·gin·ning 

/bəˈɡiniNG/ 

_noun_

_the point in time or space at which something starts.)_

Kakashi tried to get on his feet and regain his dignity, but it was all in vain. He just let Sakura drag him to the hospital. 

The first time of many. 

he was thirsty 

He thought about making some coffee, but decided against it. He went for a tea. 

Walking around the house to look for something clean to wear is always a hard task. Maybe he should call Sakura — nah. She would yell at him and say stuff about food and, and, and - a fucking shit load of thing he didn't want to hear at the moment. If he had the strength he could pop up at her place and steal some of his clothes he kept there, but he didn't remember her schedule for today and yeah. Not worth all the mess. He just went for another one of his standard clothes that it might seem that was all he had (it kinda was). 

The kettle buzzed and he made his tea with all the patience in the world. Making tea is something that always calms his nerves. 

His father taught him that and it was one of the few thing connected to his father that didn't hurt. 

Despite all of this, when he tried his tea it tasted like shit so he just decided to mix it with some alcohol (3⁄4 alcohol, 1⁄4 tea) and that's it, life isn't fair, tea was worse than Naruto's soldier pills (he decided to improve Sakura's receipt and they went from tasting like shit and misery to taste like what would be cat's shit [it stink worse] with all your dreams being crashed right in front of your eyes). The alcohol didn't make it taste better, just gave him an excuse to drink it. 

After making his tea/booze ritual as slow as possible, he took a shower taking all the time in the world to appreciate how the soap works on the human body, how the water particles hit your skin, how the water evaporates, the way you go all goosebumps once you leave the warmth to grab your toil, how soft or raw it can feel. He looked at his face, at the gray beard trying to fight its way out his face, barely a stumble. He knew it was barely noticeable and it wasn't bothering him, but for the elders he decided he would shave it, to leave them to bath on his aftershave cream. 

His clean face in the fogged mirror had a smirk that showed his crown feet. 

**08.03.14 13:42 PM**

At precisely 13:42 PM he arrived at the Tower to meet up the elders, his Hokage cloak in place, the hat obscuring his face. 

They had cancelled all of his meeting for the day. You see, being a Hokage sucks completely. You have tons of papers to sign, people keep appearing with petty excuses to fight, you have to travel for diplomatic reunions, you have meetings everyday about everything. 

As soon as Madara vanished, Tsunade almost woke him up with the hat shoved at his face followed by a festivity. A small celebration — what were they celebrating no one knew, but it was more an excuse to get drunk and have one night stands without guilt. He did the same. At that night, no one was the real them. Naruto wasn't Naruto, Kakashi wasn't Kakashi, Hinata wasn't Hinata, Ino wasn't Ino, Tsunade wasn't Tsunade, Kurenai wasn't Kurenai, Genma wasn't Genma, Shikamaru wasn't Shikamaru and so on. Civilians were there. The Allied Forces were there. Everyone was there.

All they were could be summed up as soldiers, nameless people, bodies, tired bones, scarred person, trying to find something to hold onto to, just for one night. 

It wasn't just about sex. It was about intimacy, about holding someone close when you were seconds away from dead just a blink of eye before. It was about loneliness, fear, gripping tight into something real before you suffocate. 

What happened at that night stayed there. No one ever talked about that. It was like putting on a mask. (For Kakashi, it was like lowering the mask for a night.) 

He hadn't slept at the Hokage Tower for months. He could feel the dead crippling over the walls and it only made the nightmares worse. 

He made his decision and, in the dead of the night, left. It wasn't hard to move out, once he didn't had that many things to pack. He left his bed and most of his things there. He just brought decoration stuff, which barely filled one bag. His whole apartment was smaller than the single bedroom at his Hokage made up home. 

He hated it from the first moment to the last. The place was a reminder that people trusted him and he had to make them justice. It was a place that reminded him about Minato-sensei and every time he looked at the robe he felt like he was a child stealing things from his father — and those thoughts always stung in a way that made the air hard to breath. Everything there was just a reminder. It wasn't home. It seemed more of a cage just like the office. The obedient monkey jumps from cage to cage. 

_(Kakashi always hated monkeys. They're loud, tricky and it feels like they're always laughing at your expense and planning their next move. One could say it is the resemblance with humans that makes him hate them, but it is the eyes. They have eyes that watch you in that way that makes you feel naked in front of a crowd and they are the bullies. They are always jumping and always too fast and always clever. Kakashi is clever. So are the monkeys. Both live in cages. Both hate it. Now it is just a competition to see who escapes first. Kakashi doesn't like the odds.)_

When Obito died he considered fleeting the room for good, but was scrambled back (unconscious) a few days later. He woke up at the couch of the living room in a very uncomfortable position with one of the worst hangovers of his entire life. It took him a long time to gather his surroundings and that was to waste. The room was still spinning and he puked out of the window — he didn't had the time (nor remembered the direction) to reach the toilet, so out it was. He had no idea where that window led, he just hope it wasn't to the main street. He cleaned his mouth with the back of his hand and went to the bathroom where he spent most of the day. 

He woke up when the day had set. His arm was tingling due him sleeping over it the whole day, over the open toilet seat, the clear water waving at him, after being washed many times. His legs and back hurt from being sat in that position the whole day and his neck was stiff from his head resting over his arm for all those hours. He had drool dripping out his mouth, vomit over his shirt and his pants, he reeked, his lips were dry and his head banged miserably at him. 

That was the picture that would become the signature of Kakashi along with the scarecrow: a grown man, silver hair, a mask pooling his neck, chin dirty with vomit, among any part of his torso and eventually his pants, his head always leaned over one arm that seemed to embrace the open toilet seat, the other arm dead at his lap, his legs sustaining his against the wall. 

Every time he walked to the kitchen he saw the bottle he nearly finished with Obito the day before he died. It was a strong whisky from somewhere that someone sent as a _Welcome-on-being-Hokage-we-own-you-cause-we-got-the-money-and-we-like-to-see-you-dance_. He wanted to toss it into the fire, but Obito stopped him and pleaded for him to keep the bottle for his last day. Kakashi tried to drive the day further and further, but that Wednesday he knew it was his last day. He probably shouldn't be drinking in his deathbed, but what harm could it cause? 

It was that day, four years, eight months and three days that Obito told him he never got drunk before and wanted to before he died. Kakashi applied. 

That was when it began. 

_(At least, that’s what Kakashi says to himself. It’s easier this way.)_

Kakashi had gotten drunk before. Plenty of times. Being a shinobi means risking your neck every beating heart out of it and, sometimes, getting drunk was all that could save them from going insane. Many men cracked before their brain told them "either you go drunk or you go crazy". Many men stayed gennin forever. Many men would quit after the first corpse, their first death. More than often, Kakashi wanted to be that kind of man. He wished he snapped all those years ago when he went on his first mission and found himself covered in blood two days before his seventh birthday. 

He hated his birthday since then. 

While he grew up he gathered more and more reasons to hate the day. It was a reminder of how many perished and him, well, a year away from death, was his actual thought every year. He wasn't suicidal, he kept repeating, he just had a natural death wish. With the life he had, it would be surprising not to have one. No one would question. 

It became a tradition. He spent a part of the day (by that you could take top two to three hours, when they were lucky) with his friends - they offered lunch and he accepted, then he would go home and take the coldest shower possible to keep the tears at bay, then he would dress up in anything and head to the bar. Each year he chose a different bar, trying to run away undivided attention, but, in the end, his friends always found him and offered to pay the bill and he'd let them. By the end of the night he would always find a way to slip and go to the Hokage monument. He sat over the Third's stone and drink up more. Sometimes he drank bottles up there, watching the city lights and people as small as ants and quieted by the distance. When morning was coming, he went to the cenotaph and talked to Obito. 

After so many years with this routine when Obito was finally back _there_ , he changed his tradition. Instead he took Obito out for lunch and then to the bar and to the Hokage monument, but not at the cenotaph. He didn't want to go there and let Obito see his own name craved. But when it was the _supposed-to-be-the-last-one-of-the-Uchiha's_ birthday he asked to go to the centopath. Kakashi brought booze and they stood there for hours to no end, just talking. 

When his best friend died, again, Kakashi broke. He wouldn't ever tell anyone, he kept them all at arm's length. He was closed up already ever since his youth, but he still showed up eventually, for the birthday lunch or when people managed to get him to eat or drink with them.

But since that day he was invisible. 

He was only seen at the Hokage Office. He wasn't seen even at the cenotaph or at the many graves that had well known names. All of his said friends didn't know shit about him or his day.

He had the new routine: wake up, take a shower, feel sorry for himself, head to the Office, eat something only when obliged, light a cigarette by the end of the day (ok, he didn’t smoke as much as Asuma, but it wasn’t just one at the end of the day, but nah - poetic license), watch the sunset, sign blindly more and more papers and scrolls and go back to his room. 

His days of a regular shinobi were pretty much the same, except the whole cenotaph part and not having to sing tons of useless things as his life was before he was a Hokage. He was still late as usual, leader or not, but no one knew the reason behind it. 

With time, he began to show up later and later, sometimes he slept over his table, sometimes at some bar and headed straight to the Tower, he lit too much cigarettes, signed too many or too little papers. The circles under his eyes just weren’t that noticeable due the mask. Still, given all the factors, no one seemed to understand why Kakashi was showing up later than usual.

It wasn't the cenotaph. It wasn't the distance, since he lived four minute from the office. It wasn't compromises once all he got were in the office. It wasn't women, 'cause they never stayed the night. No long after, people started on betting the reason the new Hokage was always late. Countless options hang on, from the mistress to cults to gambling to find a way to go to the cenotaph without being seen to being literally allergic to mornings. 

But no one saw what was right there, in their faces. Underneath the underneath, except it was in plain sight. 

The only thing that really changed in his routine was how many bottles he emptied per day. He usually got blind drunk on his birthday and after a very rough mission (to his caliber), which could be considered, top, thirty days a year. Regularly drunk was a common thing among shinobi, so it goes unsaid. But with Obito's urge to get drunk, alcohol became a natural part of his day. And after Obito's death it became an essential part of his day. 

He was drunk the whole time. 

Every day, every single second, every time someone would beat an eyelash. 

Kakashi Hatake, the General, the feared Copy Nin, the Sixth Hokage, the Legend of the Sharingan was 

an alcoholic.

When Kakashi walked into the room, he couldn't contain a sneeze — the incenses lit by the elders dominated the small room. 

_(When Kakashi looks back to that day he notices that the incenses had a clear message: chamomile for soothing and sedative properties; eucalyptus stimulates and refreshes the mind, increases concentration, causes a reassessment of concepts and values, which means big decisions; lily of the valley promotes spiritual peace, calms nerves and reduces_ fits of rage _; but the strongest smell was of frankincense: Known as "luxurious incense", it acts on the breath, relaxing and harmonizing. It was considered that it served to appease the gods. It meant only one thing: bad news.)_

That day, all he could do was sneeze and curse under his breath from the smoke and from the look in the Elders face. The whole Board was there too — even the daymo, that was hidden behind something that must’ve been a bodyguard.

The Council exists to help the Hokage govern the village and to make sure all decisions are made with the best interest of the Leaf and its inhabitants in mind.

Although the Hokage always has the final say in the matter, the councillors are there to give their opinions and advice, thus making sure the decisions made are fair and take into account all possibilities and viewpoints. Both have decades' worth of experience and knowledge and hold a social position similar to that of the Hokage. They exert great influence over the governing of the Leaf and have garnered wide support from the village's shinobi and are regarded with the same respect as that of the Hokage. 

The Board was a larger part of the Council, that consisted of the two Elders, Koharu Utatane and Homura Mitokado. Koharu liked to pretend to be a lovely woman when given the chance, giving small smiles that were as fake as Kakashi's lies. She never held it too far, but you never knew when she would throw it, only that it often was before a bad new, so she could pretend to have given it in the best way. She was a stiff, rude, too old, already on extra hour on Earth, but was humble and always had the best interest of the village in mind — never thinking about the individuals, but always in a group, which made her train of thought follow Danzo's. As about Homura, in his early days, thanks to his prudence and efficiency, Homura especially has gained the absolute faith of the Leaf shinobi.

Both fought in the Kurama attack.

The rest of the Board consisted in the most influential heads of the Fire Country, that the representatives of the most influential clans as the Hyuga, the Sarutobi, the Senju, the Uzumaki the feudal lord, the representative of the samurais, the wealthy names, one civilian and one chunnin.

After Inoichi and Shikaku passed, Ino and Shikamaru take on as Head of the Clan, but couldn’t maintain the post, as they couldn’t act as diplomats when they were on the field. Hiashi, as well, made the decision that no one would see coming in a thousand years: he stepped off as Head of the Clan to be in the field, back to his ANBU roots of so many years ago. Unfortunately, those who took the leadership for the most traditional and influential clans were assholes that didn’t give a fuck about lives being spent in the war. They were parasites, sucking off all they could from the status this position held. And, just as any old hag in the village, they hated Kakashi. Fuck, they hated even his father for what happened decades ago and their hatred extended to him due his ideals as well. 

His arm hairs stand on end. Bad news indeed. 

“If you may, I’d ask you to sit down.” the old had said. He raised one of his eyebrows and even with the mask the disdain was clear. 

“I’m fine standing, thank you.”

“You really should sit down.” it was one of the boards member that said, the Sarutobi. Both of his pale eyebrows rose, but he didn’t sit down, just leaning on a pilaster in the middle of the room. They were all eyeing him suspiciously, a hint of fear even coming from the Uzumaki. 

“Lord Hokage,” Hamuro began “the past few months have been complicated to all of us."

Kakashi snorted. 

“Complicated? That’s how you define a war?”

The Elder kept his mouth shut and it was the time of one of the bastards’ board to speak, the wealthy civilian.

“We clearly can’t truly understand how it is in the battlefield,” _no shit_ “but we have to keep an eye on the inside.” he finished, his old voice a higher pitch, his sentence followed by a dry cough.

Kakashi’s face went from disgust to curiosity — and anger. They "truly can’t understand", oh, fuck off. 

“I am aware. I rule the battlefield as much as I rule the bureaucracy. I can’t se to find a reason for this meeting at all. The battlefield gets worse everyday and more and more papers come in. Useless papers, some of them. These are the ones you” he pointed with his chin to the board, his hands still in his pockets “that send and I might say that it just gets in the way of truly important documents.”

“That’s precisely why we’re having this meeting.”

“So you can tell me that I should care about your shameless requests other than about the mission I sign my men to go so you can stay in the safety of the village?” he wrinkled his nose, in obvious washiness and apathy.

“No, Lord Hokage, that not why we are here." the old woman, name* insisted. "Please, sit down.” her eyes widened a bit, as if she was giving him a warning.

“I am fine standing." Kakashi dropped the tone of his voice. He would break the damn chair if he had to, so they'd stop to tell him to _sit down._

He hated council meetings. They hated him and he hated them. He only kept the old hags because of they knowledge of the Village and of the past Three Wars, because they were that old. Every time he dropped more and more their absurd demands and focused on things useful to his people and positive data he could use in the strategy and even to organize the mess of scrolls with a bit of tradition — the governments work in the basis of traditions. New laws are created based on the previous laws that worked; new decisions are taken based on the ones that were successful in the past. Helm is nothing but repeat old costumes and mold them into better shapes. The history doesn't change, it just molds itself. That's why wars never cease and the world don't change. The humanity doesn't know what to do from its own wellspring. 

And Kakashi tries and changes all he can, but he still lives in the shadows in his antecedents. Worse. He leaves on the shadows the Elders imprinted as well. It was like a vice, a disease, the very _roots_ of society — they've always been there. 

Kakashi was cutting them out bit by bit, because the village would be scandalized if they left in one go and he would, he admitted, lose some covered ground. But they would be out, oh, the fuckers would be out. He wouldn't let this burden to Naruto and certainly wouldn't let this weight himself until the end.

“You should sit.” the woman said again.

“I am _fine standing._ ” and would be better if she stopped talking. 

“You really should—" she tried to sound nice and that was pathetic and offensive to all he put through until now, swallowing so many frogs to keep the wheels turning for her to try to sound nice to him in the middle of a council board, as if she didn't make his life a living, walking, damming hell.

“Ok, fuck off. I have more important matters to attend.” he turned to leave, not even waving his hand goodbye, his tone still neutral, a little less aloof when the next sentence stopped him dead to his feet. He could feel the wood floor splitter a little as he poured too much chakra to his feet. 

“Like a bottle of sake?” the daymo said in the corner. Kakashi turned his back with fire in his eyes.

“Come again?”

“We are aware of your… drinking problem.” the elder woman said. She had more balls than the daymo “And we are also aware of how much this affecting the village, politically stance.” 

Kakashi ran a hand on his hair, annoyance and anger boiling up his insides, but he just exhaled loudly. 

His always dropped eyes were sharp as the kunai in his pocket and could cut any of them at any given moment. They all were too aware of it. He wondered how far they would go without trembling their voices. 

“Ok, what the board’s going to do?" Such a sarcastic tone for someone that showed so little emotion. His hands in his pockets had already cut the palm when he finally got them out. "Confiscate my booze? Accuse me of not being a sufficient of a leader?”

The silence stretched ‘til another of the old man’s board spoke.

“Precisely”.

“What?”

“We filled a request and voted upon it. You’re not leading the village rightly.” 

“What is that even supposed to mean?” 

“You are being exonerated from your position”.

The silence was only broken by the birds tweeting outside. The autumn weather was still pleasant so he could point why his interiors felt cold as he was hit with a violent snow ball right in face.

“You can’t do it.” he said adamantly, his general voice putting they where they were supposed to be, his chin lifted. “You can’t just impeachment me.” his voice was too nonchalant to be truly relaxed. 

“Fortunately, yes, we can." the elder woman spoke. Much more balls than the whole council, but she clearly didn’t have a way with words or understood when to shut up. “We already sign the petition and the votes were unanimous.” she could be smirking for all he could say “You are officially deposed.” 

Kakashi gave a little nausal laugh, inhaled, exhaled, looked at them with a little smile, tilted his head to the side, like a good boy. With a smile still on his voice, but that was so cold, so fierce, so brutal it would be wise to stay miles away from him he loudly said:

"Am I what?!" 

"You are being deposed from your position as the Hokage." the old hag said. 

Kakashi just couldn't believe her words. It wasn't that they were taking a dream away from him, it was just they were taking his job, his responsibility, his life from him. 

"You gotta be fucking kidding me." his voice was a low, dangerous tone. One that carried many hidden messages under it, but that were screaming out loud. _You are completely fucked,_ his tone implied. If not for years dealing with people in stray feelings, the Old Hag might've felt a shiver run down her spine. She maintained her face depleted from any emotion, but the actual fear was bubbling inside all of them. After all, he was the Hokage and he was one of the most powerful ninja alive. He didn't won his fame for nothing. The man was a living legend. And the living legend was furious. 

"We are not kidding, Hatake." the feudal lord said, from behind his guards, making an effort for his voice not to shake. It was useless. He could _smell_ their fear. It was at display for anyone to see it. They were afraid of him and for a good damn reason.

"What gives you the right?"

"The council deliberated and we reached this conclusion. You can no longer represent our country, you aren't apto anymore."

"And based on what was this council deliberation without my knowledge?" Every word that came out of his mouth was a quiet threat. Now they understood why the enemies feared him so much. The look in his eyes was pure evil. It carried years and years of battlefields and blood on his hands. A man whose nickname once was "Friend-killer Kakashi" didn't inspire much easiness when he was giving them his death glare. 

They should've sent a letter. And fled the country as long as his rage lasted. But it wasn't like the man was going to destroy the entire building. 

"Your issue with alcohol." the old rat that now stood for the Hyuga said. 

His. Issue. With. Alcohol. 

They were disposing him because he was an alcoholic. 

Kakashi shook on his next words, not knowing what to say. He brought this to himself. And, yet, he couldn't believe he fucked up that big. 

"That's not the only reason." he was staring at each of them dead in the eye and, fuck, maybe their death sentence laid there, in this man. Without the sharingan, was he still able to dispose all the guards? 

"What are you trying to imply?"

"Alcoholism is a disease, not children's play. If you really cared about this, you'd sent me to treatment. You wouldn't spread rumors about me. No. I know what this is about. I was not that good of a pawn, was I?"

This time, it was the person he last thought that spoke. It was Tsunade. She'd kept herself hidden from his sight till now, she was stepping into the light, her face solene. "I am afraid that is one the reasons, Kakashi."

"Tsunade?" He was perplexed. "What are you even doing here?"

"I am part of the council, a small part. So small they didn't consider my vote onto this because they didn't even told me they were going to deliberate. So, _no_ " she looked in the eyes of every single person in that room and said with a voice as strong as a thunder "there wasn't unanimity."

"How dare you?” the Iamanaka piece of shit shriquered “The Princess is trying to step on our toes, when even you couldn't-"

"Shut it!" Kakashi spoke. If Tsunade's voice was a thunder, his was a whole storm into a hurricane. "Tsunade, leave." he didn't even look at her direction, just pointing minimally in the direction of the door.

"Why would I-" the woman began to plead, not angry at all. If he didn't know better, her eyes could betray fear. 

"Tsunade, please, leave. I am not officially out, so this still is an order."

"You are officially-" the feudal lord began and was promptly turned into a shaking mess under his bodyguard.

"Shut that fucking mouth of yours while you still have it." Tsunade yelled at the man's face.

"Is this a threat?" The Old Hag said, full of defiance the ones that carry important positions think they have nothing to fear, they are politically untouchable. Such a mistake. 

"Is it?" The Sharingan spinning swiped them off their feet.

“Hatake, when did you -” Nara tried to speak, but the charcoal was on fire - and it was convinced to take them all in the incendiary mess. 

"Tsunade." A word, her name, an order. As soon as she closer the door, Kakashi performed a few hand seals and slapped the wall, showing a seal that made the room soundproof.

Where is the untouchable certain? “If you paid actual attention to the War, you’d know it already.”

"Hatake, what do you think—"

"SHUT IT!" his voice rumbled all over the small room and that was it: the end. The captain sinking with his ship. And they were mere tripulantes. "How dare you? _How dare you_ act behind my back? How dare you think you have a voice, a thought, the right to tell me how to run my country? Before you say anything, feudal lord, choke on it. Your money doesn't buy the life and death decisions I make everyday. That's the whole fucking problem, yes? 'The Hatake kid is too troublesome, let's take him down. Let's make him look like a mess, out of control' isn't it?" no one dared to answer. 

Kakashi shook his head, looking down and laughing with no amusement and pure bitterness. 

"This" he pointed to a chair in the middle of the room, a dark wood chair, with red pillow, um encosto detalhado, as pernas tortas num estilo proposital "that's the chair you told me to sit on, hu?" He was smiling, his voice light, bright, as if he was talking to a children. When no one answered he took it as a yes. "That's my chair then. Hum. Good" he was with his hand on his chin, nodding, a not bad expression. "Good"

Then he grabbed the chair and threw it to the wall, shattering it in thousands of small wooden pieces and espuma. He laughed, amused, with all the eyes wild and trying to get as much distance as they could from him, leaning of the walls and over their chairs. 

"Hatak —"

"This one here, what's even doing here? Did someone of the council couldn't come today?" The same light, happy tone. "I asked if someone couldn't come. Answer me" he yelled-spat and when one of the bodyguards, bravely, shook his head. "Oh, it is just a spare chair? Then it won't be missed" he lifted it and threw against the wall again. "Woah, and this?" He pointed at a small statute "Is this, huh, Buda?" Some of the rats nodded. He admired the piece again, before throwing it out of the window, shattering the entire glass with one strike. The glass fell all over the floor and onto some of them. 

Kakashi was having a good time. Now it was clear why Tsunade liked to throw things around. It helps you discharge some of the will to kill. 

"Control yourself! See?" One of the members, the civilian said. "That's why you can't —"

"That's why?" Kakashi's glaze froze the man. "This? Because I've never done this before. Maybe there's something to do with, I don't know, _Itachi?_ "

The air went still. Kakashi grinned. Oh, he wanted a camera to register this moment forever. Homura looked a little pale, even. The feudal lord swallowed. 

"Oh, then it is? The fact I've known, all those years, it was _your_ fault?" He pointed with his chin to the Elders, his voice calm, just like the calm before the storm. At least three people looked at them, their eyes wild. "Oh!" He covered his hand with his mouth and said with all the innocence in the world. "Sorry. They didn't know? They didn't know _you_ and Hiruzen were the ones behind the massacre?" That made him angrier. He was leaning his elbow in the pillar and punched the wall. "Didn't they?"

"You brought this to yourself, Hatake. Don't try to blame it on us. You didn't take your role as Hokage seriously. You vanished for almost a month —"

"To rescue my students —"

"Rescue the traitor —"

"You fucking wanted him."

"You weren't even able to keep the boy save."

"Do you think I didn't fucking try? I "didn't take my role as Hokage seriously" to rescue _him_ , to make sure he would make it out alive."

"But he didn't."

"And what could I do?" this time he punched a hole in the pillar through the other side. 

"It is not up to us to —"

"You wanted a meeting when I was dropping their dead bodies in the floor!"

"And you denied."

"You can't be serious." He put his head in his hands and shook it, not believing what he was hearing. "You fucking hated him."

"But he was good for political relation—"

Homura didn't finish his sentence as Kakashi did what Tsunade always did: he threw a heavy vase in his direction. The man broke it into pieces with a kunai.

The room fell silent, just a mosquito giving in that they didn't go deaf.

"You brought a War Criminal in and let him stay, let him get treatment."

"He redeemed himself by giving us information on all the Akatsuki had done, all they left behind, he gave us everything he had on Madara. What he rent was crucial to us."

"You only allowed him back due you emotions."

"Does it matter? He's dead now."

"You put your people in danger."

"I monitored him 24/7."

"While drunk."

He felt it stir in his eyes again. He felt like a dog whose leash slipped its owner's hand and his bite was harsher than the bark. 

"You didn't take down the Uchiha traitor when he showed up at the battlefield."

Kakashi felt his throat close. "How could I take him down when he was the one that gave us shelter and as soon as the sun touched the earth, he vanished?"

"You and the Haruno girl —"

"That was proved to be fake years ago. This argument is invalid."

"You allowed another War Criminal in our grounds. Another Akatsuki member."

The woman lifted his hand and looked at the civilian, urging him to shut up.

"Oh, _Itachi_?" it was funny to see how they flinched. "Do we have to go around all the facts you were the ones to —"

"Not about his crime against his clan. He was a War Criminal, an associated of a Criminal Organization S-ranked."

"As far as I recall, I wasn't the one that kept him hidden for years."

Kakashi took their moment of disorientation and decided he wanted to ruin that room as much as they ruined him.

"Come on guys!" Kakashi said, his arms open, looking at everyone else, smiling wild "Let's keep up with our game." _'The game'_ being pick things to break and throw around. "What about this one? And this? And these? And that?" 

He kept asking and kept throwing. Out of the window, at all the walls, at the floor, smashing it with his feet or his hands, crushing things with his fists, punching the pictures from the wall - making holes on the wall or just shattering the paint. When one of the members went for the door, all he had was a "oh, no, you don't" followed by a really heavy book that broke part of the wood of the door. 

"You wanted to paint me as insane, didn't you?!" he kicked another small table, smashing it under his feet when it fell to the ground. " _Didn't you?_ "

He looked insane.

His voice was mild and sometimes took his secluded tone - yet, he looked fucking insane. He snapped. 

"Well, thank me later for making it easier on you" he punched a wall and a cleft started to run from the bottom to the middle of the ceiling. He tilted his head, amused with the possibility of the roof falling over. 

"Hatake, let us explain this better." It was the new representing of the so lovely ROOT, but they described him as "wise, old friend of the Village with the common interest for the best"88

"Better? How?" a small blue vase to the ground "How would you enlighten me about the situation?" Um peso de papel num formato de cachorro made a hole on the wall "How can you _explain_ this to me, if I already understood?" A bottle of water splashed at their feet.

"We should talk it over..."

"Talk it over?" his orbs were dancing, his pupils dilated, his head spinning and a maniac laugh roaring through his lips. "Talk what over? There is nothing" he pontuou the word with another loud crash of something metallic "we need to clarify".

As the room was now soundproof, no one would hear them in the Tower and come running asking what the fuck was going on. 

Kakashi wasn't a man to go on rampant. He never was. He usually sweat it off training, killing, _drinking._ But now it seemed he couldn't drink. He lost his job because of this, didn't he? So he better destroy the entire room, then the entire Tower, then keep on destroying shit until he couldn't anymore. 

" _Hatake_!" Homuru yelled from a corner. The Elders were ninja. They were old as fuck, but they could take him down, probably, especially if they worked together, so why weren't they trying? "Stop this insanity!"

"Why should I, Homuru- _sama?_ I thought I lost it and that was the reason you decided to take me off."

"You know pretty much it isn't —"

"Oh, for fuck's sake." Kakashi rolled his eyes and threw a small cat-like statuette in his direction. "CATCH!" he yelled with a big smile, as if he was playing with the boys. 

Maybe he really lost it. He never, ever lost his cool. Not like that, not in public. But after all he'd been through for the past almost thirty years for this village to end like this? 

His disappointment was sincere when someone managed to work off one of the seals and manage some sound out. He sighed and shook his head. 

"May I assist you with it." He walked in the direction of the man — a wealthy retired chunnin that held a personal grudge against him and his father — and decided to go for a Rasengan to put a hole in the wall and break the seal. The man didn't look happy at that, but Kakashi grinned. He lowered himself to the point of being face to face with the man and whispered in his ear. "You're welcome." and then he kicked the small table that was adjacent to the wall and made a bigger hole, sending the splitters of wood to the corridor. 

It was just a matter of time now.

He stopped throwing things around with the same energy as he was running low of objects, but as he saw the feudal lord leaving through the hole, he felt it. He felt it burn. He would have to talk with Sakura about this. Well, if there would be any remaining of Kakashi to be talk to. He honestly hope it didn't. 

Kakashi performed the Chidori chain to send the brick blocks that held the Elders' chairs atop out of the hole that now was the whole wall fallen. He smirked. If it is to go down, may it be making a goddamn pathetic show. 

(The last hit that crumbled the remaining of the wall to the floor, made the cracks to the ceiling intensifier and, for a moment, Kakashi just stood there, looking above and thinking, about that unfaithful day, 20 years ago. The day he would've been smashed by a rock, but Obito took his place. It seemed like a lifetime ago. He could still hear the rocks cracking and falling all over each other. When he learnt that Sakura's fight with Sasori costed the whole ceiling of the cave, his heart skipped a beat. He couldn't stop, but he _had_ to, but he _couldn't._ He kept repeating to himself that Sakura would be fine, that she fucking had to be fine, that there was no other possibility other than be okay. Every step he took and every rock he heard, it was like a vice squeezing his heart and puncturing his lungs. He wouldn't be able to make it out if something like that happened again. 

It wasn't a matter of play hard _what if_ he died that day instead of Obito, because why the fuck would Madara take interest on him? He was just a prodigy arrogant brat and that was that. Madara wouldn't recruit him, no sharingan, no Uchiha, no nothing. He would've died an honourable death. 

But he didn't. 

And now he was here. 

Shitting in Obito's dream, just as he did with Rin and everything else.

Looking at the ceiling, he closed his eyes and wondered if if it fell it would be enough to kill him.)

"Lord Hokage!" 

Kakashi opened his eyes and was dragged back to reality. One of his AMBU guards was staring at him, his fear and concern mixed and Kakashi took pity on the man. _Lord Hokage._ He wasn't Hokage anymore and he really, really took pity on the man. 

"What is going on?" 

The boy looked concerned, not judgemental. 

"The news didn't reach it out yet?"

"News?" The boy with a turtle mask tilted his head to the side, confused. "Which news?" He turned alert in the blink of an eye. "Are we under attack?" 

Incredibly, in the middle of all that, Kakashi smiled. The boy couldn't be more than 16. The present standards for AMBU didn't drop, but the kids had to train much, much harder because they were soldiers and had to be sent to the field every time. He really took pity on him. 

"Look, kid," Turtle immediately looked at him and that was a keen of admiration in his eyes. "take the day off."

"But s—"

"It's an order." 

The boy nodded and shunshied away, just as more AMBU appeared — and they were eyeing him meticulously, studying him. _Yeah, the news leaked._

Kakashi sighed. He knew ANBU. He trained them, he was one of them, this men were _his_ men, he would still go in short term missions with them. He knew their protocol and how they operated. It is a cardinal sin to attack your Hokage, but he wasn't Hokage no more. _So…_

Kakashi launched. They were a group of four — and they were young. Kakashi always tried the best he could to not send kids to the field, even though the Village was proofing to be more and more dangerous every passing day. He took the four of them in less than a minute and kept going. Ten meters ahead, another group. And then another, and another, and another, and another. 

The place was a mess. He had already fucked up two floors. He didn't care the least. But he needed to reach his office, that would've been easier if the rumours and gossip and, well, the fact he blew an entire room didn't drew attention to him, he could've just go straight there. 

Kakashi was leaving traits of bodies and ruined furniture, digging holes in the walls, in the floor, electrifying patterns in the carpets, in the wood floor, drenching, leaving burn holes, dragging his fist through the wall like Sasuke did when he tried to kill Itachi. (Of fucking course he didn't fucking kill anyone, but it wasn't rock, paper, scissors to see who'd win. It was a mini battle, but a battle nonetheless. And he was leaving people in a pretty fucking bad shape).

When he reached his Office, the tower was made of hot water trying, causing curtains of smoke, broken, broken pieces of everything everywhere, mud and earth, dry earth and fire, just as the world came to existence; just as it would disappear. 

He knew what he needed, so he didn't miss a bit on taking it. And then he felt _her._ And, by her, he was doomed. 

It was the beginning of a Civil War. He knew, she knew, they all did. Yet, it was out of their hands. All they could do was destroy everything in their way — she would try to stop him. But it was just the beginning of the fall.

Turning around to face the door, he was ready to meet his destiny, in his fight instance, the adrenaline making his blood pump so loud in his ears he couldn't hear all the voices trying to drown his in self depreciation. They would have to wait.

It was the beginning of a Civil War.

* * *

**five years before**

* * *

_July 3033, 3 years after the beginning of the 4th Great Ninja War_

* * *

"Have you ever thought about dying?"

He lifted an eyebrow and she took another bite of the now damp dango, just to spit it. "Suicide."

Never had a word hang so heavy on the air

"You know, just... ending it all."

"My father did."

"I know. Depression is genetic."

"Are your parents depressed?"

"Not really."

"Then why are you?"

"Genetics is only a part. Life is another."

"So, have you?"

"I asked first." He shrugged. "Yes."

Some bells in the distance ringed, the breeze sang a song and filled the empty space they were in. It was the Hatake compound. 

No ghosts, but full of spider webs.

She didn't enter Kakashi's room. She didn't want to. She was afraid to step on Sakumo's blood or Kakashi's toys and that would tear out her skin and no chakra would ever heal it. She'd rather just live with his dark eyes matching the carpet, but never going far enough to find the curtains to match his hair.

"Why?"

Sakura laughed. "Is there a right answer to it?"

"No."

Some birds chipped, the crickets were about to take their place. 

The whole room was pink and orange. It made him look like sin, it made her look like an angel. 

"I've thought about it." A pregnant pause. He was staring out of a closed window, his mind far, far away. "Plenty of times."

"How many of us, uh?" Kakashi wiggled an eyebrow. "It's not our privilege to think about it. It might be for us to be alive."

"Kisame killed himself."

"So did Deidara."

"Yahiko, Neji, Shisui, your father, Haku… Haku died the same way as —"

"I used to think that I should've died instead of Rin and Obito. They would get married. Have cute kids."

"You don't know that."

"I do."

"No, you don't."

She didn't look at him and he didn't look at her. 

"Maybe Obito died in the next mission or maybe the cave collapsed over Rin. Maybe she didn't love him. Maybe he cheated on her. I don't think their hair would match. There is no place more distant in the world than yesterday."

"There would be no war."

"But there was and they didn't, and you dying wouldn't make sure they wouldn't."

"I should've died instead of Minato."

"And seal Naruto?"

"If Rin didn't —"

"Rin was not your fault."

"Yes, she was."

"Was she? You kidnapped her, Kakashi?"

He didn't answer. She looked at the ceiling. There were water pools and it was staining in yellow. 

"I was the one that delayed her rescue."

"I read the file."

Sakura felt his eyes burning her cheek, but she made sure to keep any tears at bay. She shouldn't want to cry. 

When she fell under Tsunade's tutelage, she had to read about Kakashi's transplant — she had to read about the day Obito died. It was supposed to stop on the medical file, but she broke through and read his. There were days she wish she didn't. He opened up at tiny bits, just like a pregnant women dilate to give birth. Instead, she cut with a hot knife and now she caused the infection.

He nodded, scratching his wrist. He does that when he wants to drink. He also cracked all his bones, but mostly his hands. Over and over, until the bones wouldn't crack anymore. She scratched her veins, or just bit her finger, hard. 

(She used to crack her fingers too, but after she broke four just as an excuse, she stopped.)

"Rin was not your fault. You didn't kill her. She killed herself."

"She died by my hands." Sakura didn't say anything. "I know you read the file."

"Rin's I didn't." He lifted a pale eyebrow. "Obito told me." Sakura started to pick under her fingernails with a kunai and just stopped when Kakashi put his hand over hers — she didn't notice it was bleeding. "She was a war weapon. It was all a war plot. She was a tool, you were a tool."

"I used to think suicide was cowardice."

"Don't we all?"

"I used to hate him. People think they understand, but they don't. There is something else about suicide. _Attempt_ is something. People hug you and pat you in the back. Some worry, some don't. We're all suicidal, we shinobi. How else do you explain our life?" He lit a cigarette. 

He said he would try to stop smoking. She called it bullshit and he knew she was right. Everyone knew what would kill Asuma and Sarutobi — and what killed them. They knew what would kill Shikamaru. Kakashi would be no different. 

Sakura liked to share cigarettes with him. Sharing bottles and smoke make you feel like creating a bond. Is ridiculous, but it does. 

She was taking a drag and watching the smoke around him, how it made him look like a golden god, some thing that came out of books to kill in all possible ways. To kill and to get killed. To perish and to conquer. With the smoke around him, caught him in a swirl, the sun making it dance, so fragile, she wanted to cry.

"We don't die shallow deaths."

"Taking your own life is shallow?"

His eyes locked with hers, the wheels spinning, recording her, accusing her, his voice a submersible jump in a frozen lake.

It could've been a whip, a hot metal pressed against her tights, an eye ripped out, her heart out of her chest still beating and it would've hurt less. _Taking your own life is shallow?_

"When I learnt about my father and the way he died, I realised that ending your life is the most difficult thing to do."

Would my hands shake?, could've been a question but the smoke swallowed it.

"Sometimes, I wonder who'd go to my funeral." Sakura's voice was light as a plume, but hit the air as iron. Even in death, maybe no one cared. Would it matter? (Yes) Her fingers touched his when she handed him the cigarette, the tip of it could be as hot as the Sun but nothing could burn as the palm of his hand when it touched her breasts over his gloves.

"I wouldn't." She just turned to look at him, a small frown in her face. Her fingers were numb. "I have to die before you."

"No. You don't."

"It's nature's law. I am older, I die first."

"This doesn't apply to us." _We, shinobi._

"I... just wouldn't."

He left unsaid the _I couldn't stand if you died_ you're my best friend; can my best friends do me the favour to stop fucking dying?, and she left unsaid the same. They didn't have to share this words.

Death is the cruelest kind of torture.

The sun walked in the sky and the cigarette died in her last drag as she asked before spelling the smoke.

"What do you do when you feel like a failure?"

"Am I that much of a failure you come to me for advice?"

"Fuck off." Sakura laughed and it just felt right because things felt right with him around. "It's just... I still feel left behind. I still live in their shadows. I am not "Sakura Haruno", I am the Hokage's apprentice, Naruto's teammate, Kakashi Hatake's —" she cut great mid sentence. There was already a lot they were referring her to when connected to him, there was a lot to be, to not be. " _t-teammate_." She laughed with a dark humour, that made the sky look crystal clear. "They like to call me _your whore._ I am not even not even a fucking person. You know? It's never, "oh, hey, you're Sakura!", it's always "you're the girl that's related to someone bigger than you". Friend, teammate, apprentice, _whore._ " The bitterness in her tone was almost sweet. It was like she considered a lost cause, but still worth fighting for, even not believing it. "Sasuke overcame this." 

Kakashi wasn't expecting her to say this when he had the answer already on the tip of his tongue, so she could see the confusion there when he looked at her. "He used to be "the last of the Uchiha", but now he is Sasuke. When will I be Sakura?"

A gush of wind too strong to be natural crossed the street and they looked at how ir distorted the trees and she thought about how much she wished she could mold the air around her. People oversee Wind just as they oversee Earth. But Wind can swipe entire civilizations and that's what Sakura wanted to do. Maybe if she wiped the world clean she could be reborn with her own name.

"When will you let them know?" Kakashi said looking at the leaves. 

He could use Wind as much as he could use Earth. They could battle and see if a hurricane can surpass a earthquake.

"About?"

"About you."

Pretty vague, but she knew what was he about. 

(She found out about Naruto less than a month ago. She found out that she wasn't the only one that assassinated just as she learnt tree climbing. The biggest surprise of all was that Sasuke was the one that took the most. Not because Kakashi was trying to preserve him, but because he _couldn't._ Sakura really shouldn't think of this word, but it was because he was _weak._

She remembered the mission. It was a big man, bigger than any of them would like. Kakashi got rid of him in the blink of an eye and they all breathed easier, even smiled until it happened — it wasn't one, it was two. In the shinobi world, twins are rare. Identical twins even more. Identical twins that the fucking client _forgot_ to tell you about and you're in the middle of enemy territory, surrounded by cows and mountains, are even more rare and worse, much worse. Kakashi didn't sense him because he wasn't a ninja. He was just a man and that made him even more dangerous. He looked at his brother's body on the floor and without any chakra flaring he attacked. He looked like a giant, not a man. His brother was easier to summit precisely because he was a shinobi and he was caught in his own traps, his own jutsus, his own arrogance. This man was just ire and his eyes gleaned red so vivid she'd say he was an Uchiha. His name was Hanari, she never forgot. 

Kakashi was the first to fall followed by Naruto. It left her and Sasuke. Dear Sasuke, so full of himself, so powerful, such a prodigy, perfect and crafted by angels — but Sakura learnt that there are no angels in a battlefield and there was no glory when Sasuke pissed himself. 

The smell hit her nose like a punch. It was just the two of them and they were cornered in a kitchen. Kakashi had a nasty gash in his head and he bled so much that Sakura's fingers trembled when she tried to wake him, afraid he had choked in his own blood. Naruto made his thousands of shadow clones, but when Hanari lifted him by the neck, choking him, there was no use. Naruto had such a deep bruise Sakura was afraid he would mingle with the soil. 

They were chakra depleted, basically. Fighting Hanari's bother (she never catch his name) was out of the plans, because he wasn't supposed to pull up so much of a fight. He wasn't supposed to be there. They just stopped by the goddamn house because Naruto needed to wrap his leg properly and Sakura wasn't a medic at the time. She was 13. They were genin. Kakashi was supposed to be on his feet and Hanari on the floor, not the other way round. 

But it was Sasuke in front of her, the wooden door at her back cracking, the knob poking at her ribs in a way that left a purple bruise, her hair glued to her forehead and he had a kunai pointed to the man. It was what they had. It was a stupid, stupid mission. A C-ranked shit that, as always, turned against them. With his kunai at his face, Hanari _laughed_ because he was easily thrice their size. Sasuke's aim was perfect and when the shuriken embed in Hanari's forearm and he just looked angrier it was the moment he peed himself. It might look fucking pathetic considering all they've been thought, but they were children in the middle of nowhere, with a sharingan that did shit, with a civilian that was so angry that shrugged off shurikens. 

He threw Sasuke around the room and broke a table. Sakura knew what he was to do to her before he even looked at her. She felt in the cold air that entered through the cracks of the door and tickled her shins. He had a predatory look on his face. She was petite. She looked like a prey and he looked like a lion drooling. There was no Kakashi sensei for god know how long. 

She was about to be raped. 

She was never kissed, she never held hands, no one brushed her hair past her ears or told her beautiful she was and that troglodyte was about to take off her virginity in the worst way possible. (And it wasn't up to be the last time) 

When his ugly, hugs hands yanked her down by her long, soft hair and opened his pants, shoving her face in, she did the thing he deserved: she bit it out. 

Her face was full of blood when he slapped her with enough strength to break a chair. But when he tried to jump on her again, she stuck a kitchen knife into his eye and his scream fills the void of her nightmare till the present. She didn't need to stab him, but she did. She didn't need to cut his throat, but she did. And when Kakashi woke up she didn't want to be scared of him, but she did. 

With that amount of blood all around her, her skin and her clothes, Kakashi took his time boiling water and giving her a cloth. When he gave her his spare shirt, she cried and he let her. That was when Sakura knew she could trust him — and that she could take care of herself in the shadows because as much as she would never forget Hanari's face when he was dying she would never forget the look on his face and how afraid of herself she was)

"I still don't feel like I am enough."

"I know. I feel the same."

"You?!" Sakura turned to him, incredulous. Kakashi Hatake not being enough is laughable. 

Isn't?

"Yeah." He laughed, humorless. "No matter what people say, what I accomplish, the price over my head in Bingo books, I will always and forever feel like I am not enough." He shrugged and kicked a rock. His shoulders were too tense, but his eyes were too heavy. It was like he was just thinking out loud. "And before you get started, it's not because the deaths. It's not just the guilt, just the certainty of failure. I just feel like... like I once had potential and I explored it and overcame it, but it isn't enough. I think it will never be."

"Why? Just — why? Will it ever be enough?"

"Which are the parameters?"

"We're human." Sakura said with a frown, her eyebrows knitted together. "We shouldn't be soldier kids."

_Yet, we are. Yet, we chose._

"Once I read that we are like the moon, crafted with imperfections and noted just when convenient. The moon understands how it is to be like us."

"Did you know that when you die your brain gives you a strong shot of hormones that gets you high, so high that it is the best feeling you will ever experience? Somedays, I think we made that oath having in mind that dying would be our happier moment."

"We seek happiness till our dying day. We won't ever be satisfied. Never. We keep climbing a mountain that never ends, that surpass the clouds and the atmosphere. We will keep on climbing —"

"But we will never reach."

"I like it when you complete my sentences."

She smiled and it was contagious, because his mask moved too. If you can't laugh, then smile. 

"We won't ever be enough."

"Nope."

"And we have to be fine with it."

"Precisely."

She nodded and looked away, seeming content, just to look back at him with all the fire in hell in her eyes. Why he always had to do that to himself?

"What about failure, then? What about feeling fucking useless, no matter what people say?" She spat his words against him like it was poison; and, like poison, it always got in her bloodstream as well. She wanted to hurt to see if something would leak, but she knew what would hit her.

"Sakura." Her eyes burned holes into his soul and his eyes drowned her lungs. "We only listen what we want to listen. We only see what we _want_ to see. We are not failures. We just haven't accept us. Accept we are humans."

"And being human hurts." A single tear fell from her eye, stopping at her chin. 

He cleaned it and traveled his hand to her cheek. His mask was now pooled at his neck, and fuck his smile could bright the whole country. But he never smiled and the lamp posts were broken.

"I fucking hate crying." 

"You look pretty when you cry."

She did indeed looked beautiful crying. Beauty is a concept we live inside, and she was her own kind of beautiful. Her eyes would ever get more green and the way her cheeks and nose went red made her look like a — deer. But in a good way. It made her cute, but it made her furry. The tears she was shedding could be acid, if touched by the wrong person.

"There is nothing wrong with crying. Ever since we're born, it's been a sign we are alive."

Sakura captured his head with both hands, forcing him to look at her. For a moment, that was all it was. Her eyes didn't waver from his, even if his mask was around his neck, his pretty, pretty face for show. She already memorized every detail about it. Knew every curve, every imperfection and little scar, every melody the years imprinted and the ones he was born with. But she focused on his eyes. 

He knew what was bound to happen. They knew. They always knew.

But it never happened. They also never needed. 

In the world, there is passion, lust, love, desperation. 

In their world, it wasn't different, apart love that was much rarer — at least to work out. They die too young and too afraid. 

If I tell you Kakashi and Sakura fucked, you will turn around and leave. If I tell you they didn't, you might as well, because only those in their skin knows how it is like. Maybe not even them. Sex is sex and always has been and always will be. Nothing can change that. No fairytales or utopias. Sex is raw and the nature proves it all along. 

We don't need sex here to make a statement — but maybe you do need to think and break free and realize that between life and death, they'd rather die knowing they gave something to each other. 

That's not the matter. 

The only matter in hand is that they were no longer alone in the shinobi world. The useless Sakura no one gave a shit about and the distant Kakashi. For a fleeting moment, she had her hands in his faces and he saw himself, tiny, tiny

(INEZ: Suppose I try to be your mirror? Sit down. Come closer. Closer. 

Look into my eyes. What do you see? 

ESTELLE: Oh, I'm there! But so tiny I can't see myself properly. 

INEZ: Don't worry about him. As I said, he doesn't count. We're by ourselves. ..Ask 

away. 

ESTELLE: Are my lips all right? 

INEZ: Show! No, they're a bit smudgy. 

ESTELLE: I thought as much. Luckily no one's seen me. I'll try again. 

INEZ: That's better. No. Follow the line of your lips. Wait! ! I'll guide your hand. There. 

That's quite good. 

ESTELLE: As good as when I came in? 

INEZ: Far better. Cruder. Your mouth looks quite diabolical that way. 

ESTELLE: Good gracious! And you say you like it! How maddening, not being able to 

see for myself! You're quite sure, Miss Serrano, that it's all right now? 

INEZ: Won't you call me Inez? 

ESTELLE: Are you sure it looks all right? 

INEZ: You're lovely, Estelle. 

ESTELLE: But how can I rely upon your taste? Is it the same as my taste? Oh, how 

sickening it all is, enough to drive one crazy! 

INEZ: I have your taste, my dear, because I like you so much. Look at me. No, straight. 

Now smile. I'm not so ugly, either. Am I not nicer than your glass? 

ESTELLE: Oh, I don't know. Your scare me rather. My reflection in the glass never did 

that; of course, I knew it so well. Like something I had tamed… I'm going to smile, and 

my smile will sink down into your pupils, and heaven knows what it will become. 

And that's how they become. Kakashi wouldn't let anyone be his mirror, because the cracks he had in his wall were tamed, even if into pieces. It took them four months in the dark, for him to say something more than a pathetic excuse. From Ms Serrano/Kakashi-sensei to finally Inez/Kakashi was a fight. To survive looking into each others eyes, they needed to be held captive for over 200 days, so the lipstick smudge was fixed and, when the smile dunked on other's pupil, it was alright. They didn't know how their smiles tasted any more, beside the same blur as the lipstick. It was alright.)

"Don't kill yourself, Kakashi." 

(Her voice held such a tone of finality, a deep sadness that he only heard once, when a mother was burying her fifth son, her other three in tow and a baby in her arms. The woman told him that life is only precious because it ends and at the time he didn't understand.)

"What made you think I ever would, Sakura?" He said with an eye crease, pinching the point of her nose, giving a fake half hearted laugh. 

She didn't budge. 

(At the time, he was suicidal at best, throwing himself at so many dangerous missions he didn't know how he made it alive. When the woman said that, the dirt still warm and fresh in front of her, other fours crosses by its side, he understood as a sign — _go, kill yourself, kid._ When the message was exactly the opposite. 

There is a poem, by Carlos Drummond de Andrade that goes 

"Don't kill yourself, Carlos

Carlos, keep calm, love

is what you're seeing now;

today a kiss, tomorrow no kiss,

day after day tomorrow's Sunday

and nobody knows what will happen

Monday.

It's useless to resist

or to commit suicide.

Don't kill yourself. Don't kill yourself!"

And what the weary woman said to Kakashi was live while you can.)

She didn't have to say that he didn't fool her as it was written all over her face.

"I read once that — it was when I was fanning all over Sasuke and had had a fight with Ino — I read "will it matter 30 years from now?" and if the answer is no, then you already know how to deal with the problem."

"And if the answer was yes?"

"Killing yourself isn't an option. From all the tests I've taken and all I've read and studied, I've never came across it as an answer." She said with a soft voice.

Sakura smiled and put her hand in his cheek, a way a proud mother would do after telling her son ghosts aren't real. 

Ghosts aren't real, Kakashi.

In the silence that followed, the wind blew too strong to be natural and they heard the sound of trees falling, even in they eyesight they could see them burning. 

"Fuck, they're here."

In a swirl of leaves Kakashi was out and the sound of Sakura adjusting her gloves echoed in the Hatake compound.

* * *

**six years later**

* * *

_March 3036, 6 years after the beginning of the 4th Great Ninja War_

* * *

It was a friday. He knew it was a friday ‘cause Gai's been there. His wheelchair trait was still on the wet grass. Gai only came at fridays. He came everyday — but, today, it was a friday. It was raining. It was a downpour. It was cold. It was almost winter. _(according to the Weather Forecast, the situation was about:_

_temperature: 4º_

_rain: 100%_

_humidity: 93%_

_wind: 34 km/h_

Maybe it should be snowing. He wasn’t all the fond of snow. Sakura was. It froze his fingers and that was never good in the battlefield. He wasn’t in the battlefield right now, even though he wish he was. He always wanted to die, didn’t he? At least, that’s what everyone said. (They were due to leave tomorrow, anyway. Head South. It wasn’t over, he wondered if it ever would be. His fingertips would be frozen and his eyes would bleed red, but he would stay. Not leaving a comrade behind also, and mostly, means not letting them die. At least, that’s what it means; unfortunately, not what he does. Sakura always tried to convince him otherwise, just like she tries to make him like the snow: it never worked, by always made him smile, sneaking her frozen fingertips underneath his back)

It was late. The sun had set hours ago, shining gold and beautiful, twisted in the marble stone. The sunset always looked beautiful everywhere, no matter the circumstances. Mother nature is really nice and kind, isn’t she? But the sun hat set and now it was just the moon. 

They didn’t put lamp streets that far in the middle of training grounds. That never stopped Kakashi from going there and just staring at the stone.

His muscles stiffen from standing still for so long. They burned like marshmallow forgotten on the fire due a too good bedtime story. He wasn’t used to bedtime stories. He wondered if he ever had a child he probably should — he could just tell the kid about how good of an assassin he was. The kid wouldn't understand anyway, so he mentally shuggered. His whole body ached, from head to toe telling him that he shouldn’t fucking stand in the cold immobile. He let 'them burn. Maybe it could waver off like a marshmallow and he would leave feeling like something good came out of him — like he was the good history on the background instead of the villain. 

Does it make any sense?

When you stare at the abyss, it stares back at you —

The stone was meeting him dead in the eye, in a contest to see who'd look away first. 

He was fucking angry, truth be told. No matter how many times your experienced death of your loved ones, it never gets easier. It’s not like training. After a while, the punches don’t hurt you like they used to. Your body responds differently. Your muscles, tendoes, brain, bones don’t feel the impact the same way. You do get used to it. It is your carcace, your vessel, not but flesh and bones. _That_ you can train so it hurts less. 

But psychological pain is not the same. It’s not that easy. You can’t train. Kakashi tried. He drowned himself in ANBU. If ROOT wasn’t coup d’êtat part II, he probably would be blissfully brainwashed. 

Grief is a bitch. 

Grief shatter you. Have you ever experienced grief? I hope you never do. Not in the wrong order. 

_(An oldy lady - a civilian, in an Village far, far deep inearthed in mountains, fortunately oblivious to any and each war - in the splendor of her 90’s, told him that was no pain bigger to a mother to bury her own kids. That the natural order it’s always the kids to bury the parents. Kakashi’s tongue itched for him to tell her that not even knowing his mother and finding his father suicidal corpse wasn’t that natural, but she picked in the air before he said anything and poured liquor in his coffee (and in hers). Kakashi doesn’t like to be touched, but when her corrugated hand touched his, her fingers cold and her eyes understandable, not with pity he knew she knew. To her, the old lady named Aimeé, he pulled the mask off. She smiled. She’s dead, nowadays.)_

But, truth is, what is this order, anyway? In the shinobi world, everyone just dies, everyday. Nevertheless, Kakashi feels and always will that he should be the one to die first. So far, all this war has shown is that the dead come back and those who should stay leave — and Kakashi stays as if he is a root, attached and unwavering. He wonders if that's how Akatsuki sees him. He wonders if that's how his Susanoo'o looks like. 

When the self loath began and where does it end? Does if even end someday? Does this war will end?

_(Ask the bottles.)_

They used to joke that "Does Madara will ever fucking die?" They laughed and passed the wine bottle to one another, just like they will pass the canteen with sake during the trip; but now they will ask "does this shit will ever fucking end?" but is there anyone who ever knew the answer? It seem war is more of a state than a matter of who, what, where, when. It is like water. Liquid, gaseous, solid. It is there, you just need to look closely. 

You learn to live with it, after a while. We all do. 

He was born into War. Kakashi was a child soldier and now a war veteran. Still, the word tasted wrong in his mouth. It always did. Itachi told him he was a pacifist and he laughed. Shisui was a pacifist; Itachi was a pacifist; _Naruto_ was a pacifist. Him? He was akin to immortal because God wouldn't let him die and it wasn't out of kindness of his heart. No. Kakashi couldn't take himself as a pacifist. He told Itachi he was such a monster as Madara — Itachi broke his nose and Sakura refused to heal. 

Kakashi was also dramatic.

His eyes just kept looking at the kanji in front of him. Over and over and over and over. No matter how hard he stared nor how much the prayed to a God he didn’t believe, the words didn't vanish. They didn't rust. They didn’t drop and ran away. They wouldn't let him alone. They wouldn't become lies. 

_(Because, try to follow before calling me dense: when something becomes lies it isn’t true anymore. And truth means_ everything _, as much as lies means the same. They say the word isn’t a dichotomy, but when it comes to this it is. Truths and lies are different to everyone, but that’s not the point. There’s only two sides of the coin here: either you’re dead or you’re alive. When you’re name is at the Memorial Stone you’re are a truth: you’re are fucking dead. But if your name slip, if you vanish, if someone taps you in the shoulder and says “sorry, kid, wrong name” it turns into a lie, which means you are fucking alive. That’s how much your name vanishing means. It sounds pathetic, but desperation will always and forever make you look piteous - which is just another word for paltry.)_

He wouldn't scratch them, he wouldn’t grow claws and rip them away, and smile because it wasn't true — it was a fake grave and, actually, none of this names where supposed to be there. It was just a joke, a prank — one out of a thousand. None of them were dead. Bring the champanhe in.

It could be just another one of Naruto's pranks. Or even Kushina's, even though he didn't live to see it. Just any fucking prank would do it. The Memorial Stone was such a shame to exist. Didn't the Sage of the Sixth Paths want _peace?_ Why the fuck they needed a stone to the soldiers with no bodies? 

It did fucking worked with Obito, right? 

He went there _everyday_ and then the bastard wasn’t dead. He was batshit insane and wanted to destroy the whole world, that’s true, but he was _alive_ . That was all that mattered. He popped out of nowhere, mask ruined, shared vision and Kakashi was so, so angry and he loathed himself in so many ways but he fucker was alive and Heaven or something heard his unspoken prays and brought the man back — insane, twisted, filled with anger, malice and read to destroy all living forms, but Kakashi could swallow his tears and _thank you, thank you, danke, gracias, merci, arigato, fuck_. 

Why not now? 

_(Because Obito died again, after all.)_

Even — and hence — after all he's done in The War, (in the end of it, when he actually did help) some wanted his name removed from the stone. Kakashi stood adamant. If they erased — do you erase something whittled in stone? — he'd just pick a fucking hammer, a kunai, a knife, a wooden stick, anything, and put his name there again. He would crave it, kanji after kanji, until _Obito Uchiha_ was there again. 

But when people refuse to, when they declared _him_ unworthy Kakashi did it, didn't he? Craved the damn signs where they belonged. Another Uchiha no one wanted in there. But, Hokage or not, he did if by himself. He felt that was the minimum he could do. It took almost a whole day. Craving words wasn't easy. Craving knives in flesh is. He couldn’t banish the thought the whole day. 

(His father's name, wasn't at the cenotaph either. They thought, indeed, that the name didn't belong there — he did, indeed, indeed, indeed, indeed, killed himself, he didn't die in the action, he died due it, so — but, the consensus was that it didn't belonged nowhere. The name wasn't carved in any stone; he was buried as a disgrace, outside of town, south of the gates. there wasn't anything but a pile, a small mount of dirt. his father's name was nowhere to be seen. 

He couldn’t find his mother’s grave, as well. After his father died, he didn’t visit neither of them. Kakashi decided to visit his mother when he became sensei. It was 20 years later. He never said a properly goodbye to his mother. Maybe that’s why he kept coming here. Just one, one, has to forgive him. _Minato-sensei, Kushina, Itachi_ — please)

Kakashi was tired. Tired of all the self loathing that followed him for all his life. He didn't have energy, time or space for this anymore. They had a war to fight — to fight, not to win — and looming wasn't going to save them. 

("It should be easier by now." He told Minato, one day, when they were packing up the camp. "It should be easier to forgive myself. To feel useful. We defeat big guys, we bring some sort of peace. Why isn't easier?" 

"It won't ever be easy, Kakashi. It might never be possible." Minato sighed, knowing his words were harsh, but it was the truth. Kakashi knew why he was so mad. "You brought this upon yourself." 

That left Kakashi with a sour taste in his mouth; one he killed emptying his canteen. "Fuck it all, then."

Minato apologized two days later, but the truth was laid before his feet.)

He stared at the cenotaph and it stared back at him. 

_("He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." It was what Nietzsche said, he read it once. When does one’s humanity ends and it’s monstrosity begans? Shinobi forgot.)_

The sixth day of the the week, (undermentioned) the twenty-fourth day of the month. 

People love fridays: that means booze, getting shit faced, ignoring responsibilities, sleeping ‘till noon, going to bed at 5 AM, partying hard, unattached sex, one night only, using pills (they rely on painkillers, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t lowkey junkies among ninja), party rock, jump into pools, have the time of your life — things Jiraiya wrote here and there. Civilian’s lives and weekends. _Their_ fridays.

But not for Kakashi. Not for shinobi. There ain’t no festivities and weekends. There’s alcohol and sex, sweat, dirty talk, fogged windows, pills make you get hasty, make you stand for at least 15 hours without breaking a sweat of tiredness, hypersensitivity to touch, doing what’s in hand to decrease the sensitivity to pain, relax the muscles, sleeping late and going to bed with the sun rising — but they’re covered in blood during all of this.¹ 

There - _there_

was friday.

It is _funny_ that when it happened he didn’t know it was a friday. When you are covered in blood, fighting for other’s lives (because you don’t fight for yours, don’t even try to comes with this lie), when you see how blood looks when the sun is up and when it is down and you don’t know its proper colour anymore, you don’t really know how the enemy looks anymore because they are just covered as you; when you are jumping in front of fire to give it more time to medic nin to save a life, when you are carrying someone over your shoulder, when you took your last soldier pill, you don’t know it’s friday.

But when you have the time to mourn, you know. And that should be pathetic, because life and death aren’t about calendars. 

When the Fourth Great Ninja War was declared at the Kage Summit, Obito didn’t state “Evening, ladies and gentleman, today, Thursday, eight PM, a war begins.” No, war just takes place and takes lives away. That simple - that painful.

When Madara came back, he didn’t know which day it was. When Neji died, Naruto didn’t mark in his calendar if it was a Sunday. When hell broke loose, again, when Akatsuki took their sleep again, no one was taking notes. When his blood froze at the sight of Sakura splashed, not moving; when they found the bodies, when hawks knock at your window, when they rescue more ANBU masks then their bodies, when Hiddan tried to rip his heart off (again), when he saw Itachi in the middle of the hallway, when Konoha fell, when his eyes bled again, when Hiruzen died (again), when Jiraya was brought back to be taken down, when Hinata kissed her son goodbye to return to the frontlines, when Choujiro was killed by Karui inside the Leaf's Hospital, when Kakashi flushed her pills down the toilet, when their camp exploded from the inside, making Sai lose his right arm — not one of then was marking the days.

They didn’t even know when it was Christmas for the past two years. It is pathetic, Kakashi.

Even though, he knew it was friday — the third of the month. 

There were so many other kanji he visited everyday, but today he went there to speak with them, just the two of them. He wasn’t alone for the first two hours, but the rain washed away the traces of smell. (She placed her hands in his shoulder, told him she was going to pack and ruffled his hair. Deep in his soul, he smiled). He was alone now, his fingers touching the names. They were so different, in life and in death, written there, even side by side. 

One was neat, perfect, sculpted with such a delicacy that it was a crime that this handjob was a name of a deceased. The person that craved it, knew what was doing. (Maybe he was the one that carved the Hokage’s faces? That’s probably arrogance by thinking that there’s only one civilian that’s able to do such, as if they have expertise only. One fisherman, one baker, one street market — while there are dozens of shinobis with fire style jutsus. 

It’s not everyday you have a new Hokage, but everyday you have a new death.) This person had done it before. The pattern was just like all the others. It was like the name belonged there. (It fucking didn't). He gained his acknowledgment in life and now had praises in death. 

The other name was completely messy. It was barely readable. It was a slouch, distorted, asymmetrical, totally not perfectly aligned, not like someone knew what was doing. It was done in a desperate attempt by calloused hands, by someone that managed some fucking way on how to crave it on the stone. 

It wasn't raining anymore for quite a while, wasn’t it? The stone was already dry. (he must be fucking freezing, scantily-clad beneath the clear night sky, and don't stop in the winter, no. And they said it changes when the sun goes down, around here. It doesn’t. His clothes were less soaked, but ice cold. Just like South where he would bleed and die to save other’s lives from being written by their side.) There was a breeze that played with the soggy hair and blew the leaves of a nearby tree at it and at the marble (shit) stone. It was an apple tree.

He looked at Obito's name. It was smoothly craved too. 

With a last look, he held timidly his hand and barely waved. 

“Bye, boys. See you tomorrow.” His voice was strangled and his throat and mouth dry — 

_he was thirsty_

He reach for the canteen in his pocket — empty. It was a Sasuke’s gift. ‘Till the day of his death he would wonder if Sasuke hit his head or was compelled by a death threat, but the thing is he gave him a gift at Christmas. It belonged at an Uchiha, the clan crest was there. It has been almost ten years, but Kakashi never understood why Sasuke gave it to him. (He had the courage to pick it just yesterday, as they were to leave tomorrow. If felt too heavy in his pocket. He decided to leave it at his safe box. Sasuke was too heavy, just as Itachi was. He wondered, not for the first time, if Itachi would ever forgive him. If he would ever come back —

It could've been poetic. It wasn't. There was nothing poetic in death and, even less, in those that were left behind. _Those you love never die, as long as you never stopped loving them, they would live in your heart, through you._ Bullshit. Those you love die and it hurts like hell. Not-poetically he swallowed hard and walked away. 

The stone was wet with his fingerprints — it was that kind of wetness that fogs your mirror after a hot shower; it was almost delicate. Three fingers caressed the rude, rough, yet slim kanji; caressed the dead, as if tucking their hair behind their ear, moving it from their faces; like the deliberated care you have handling something that might break and fall apart if you ran your fingers roughly. Death isn’t fragile; 

_(Bless you friday and how fucking special your are. Fuck you friday and how vertiginous sore you are.)_

Everything was wet today, and not just because of the rain. His face was wet beneath the mask, was it from the drinks or from the tears. Just soaked, dripping, wet. 

Not the good kind of wet, that soaks your panties, that makes you rub your thighs to release some of tightness in your low abdomen when you can’t soak your fingers, not that wet after the summer rain you dance under, not the wet rain Itachi used to cry or the one you used to smile at when you were young with hot cocoa in your small hands, no bathtub wet. 

_Bitter_ wet. 

There are things that simply don't belong — the names didn't belong to the cenotaph, just as much peace don't belong in a war. These words didn't belong there. 

And, there, at the meticulously carved stone like an artist, like a sculptor turned white stone into an angel, a man, a rat, anything he wanted. It was like an artist put the words there, shining, glowing, glowing so hard it should make him blind — if he was blind, he would never ever again see the light leaving someone's eyes. There, at this twisted piece of art, were the words, side by side. Just as they died, side by side. They could've been holding hands. 

It didn't belong there. God forbidden.

The moon shone and they waved back from the bodiless graveyard.

_Naruto Uzumaki Sasuke Uchiha_

"See you later, sensei." A man whispered in a rich, husky voice just a low branch away. Kakashi was already too far to hear it.


	6. The Start of Something Beautiful

_July 3039, 9 years after the beginning of the 4th Great Ninja War_

* * *

It was chaos.

In all the years living at the Village Hidden in the Leaves, he ever saw such an image. He knew, when he woke up that morning, that it was over. The Leaf was over. 

The streets were turning slowly into desert, leaving a sour taste in the mouth, as the weather was humid, but the sidewalk was cracked. People either died or moved away. It became a battle field. 

Ever since they deposed Kakashi, it all turned into shit. It was the begging of a civil war. 

Danzo's puppets remained, even after that long of his death. It was almost 15 years ago, but still, the Foundation never ceased to exist. Kakashi knew, but he never managed to extinguish it. They cut and threw Sai off, cutting their only reliable source of information. All Sai was able to tell them ended up in dead ends, mostly. They didn't manage to make most of the hide outs. The only thing they were capable of doing was avoid the Foundation members to infiltrate the Anbu — at least, just as much as they could. And, watching as things unraveled, it proved not to be efficient enough. 

The new leader of the organization was an abominable woman, worse than Danzo himself. If the fucker had stayed alive, it would've been better. 

The girl was born and raised in the Foundation. The only truth she knew was Danzo's. She never knew anything good, anything decent. It should be comparable with what Sai was when they met him, but she was evil, not emotionless. She was, along two others, Danzo's pets. He raised three children under his wing to be his predecessors, if the day come, or his assistants, his right arm. Two boys and a girl. One of the boys perished in the War. He was a remarkable fighter, absolute, but died in Madara's own hands. His name was Raru and, from the three of them, he was the only that, maybe with a lot, a lot of effort could possibly see the light someday. But that day would never come and Raru was dead and so was their hope of "befriended" an enemy. The other boy was a black man (that no one had the faintest idea where Danzo found him, because there were no black people in the Leaf) and he could go on a one on one with Jugo. He had a kekkei genkai that resembled Mei's — oh, that bitch (even though, now Mei was being held captive and the New Regiment was to blame. They wanted precisely this: her kekkei genkai once Ao's was already the Leaf's allie. Mei had turned against them time to time again, never knowing which side to pick. When they found out she was managing to break free from genjutsu after genjutsu it was too late. They had her for 9 months already) — not even near that powerful, but powerful enough to be troublesome. And then, there she was, the bloody prodigy. 

It was hard to describe her. If some liked to joke that Tobirama hated the Uchiha and wanted to control them, she was the very opposite and the very same. She held the same obsession as Danzo, but the same desire to keep them in check, to mistrust them. And now that Kakashi has fallen, she had access to the fact they had currently two active Uchiha working with them and for them, for many, many years now. Two Uchiha that were supposedly dead and one that was considered a criminal, even after all his crimes were proved to be the Council's fault, but she seemed to find it funny. 'Oh, what a good soldier, killed them all, no questions, no hesitation, the perfect puppet. Such a shame he wasn't mine.' He could her saying in Madara's voice 'I'd like to see him dance.'

Kayq was a despot. She was in her early thirties, if much, probably at the end of her twenties, just a bit older than Sakura. As expected, she had Hashirama cells transplanted to her, but who the fuck doesn't have it this days? The poor man became a lab rat, basically.

During the War they had to do all it was taken to protect him — just as far as you can protect the God of Shinobi. Everyone wanted a taste of his cells, every country, every enemy. It became popular belief how many Leaf ninja had his cells implanted and how it made them more powerful and their healing process much more advanced, among other things. Even though it wasn't true. Not everyone was compatible with his cells. Orochimaru experimented in 60 children and only one, Yamato, survived. Although, they managed to perfect it and that was enough. If it fell into enemies hands they would have a nasty, nasty problem. 

But Kayq was a Leaf ninja and had his cells in her body. She had a long black hair that hit her waist with black eyes that looked like an endless tunnel at night (but there were times they turned a crimson red —but they weren't a sharingan, Kakashi ran all tests he could on that —, just like blood spilling in a white carpet and a pale skin, although not as pale as Sai's, because hers looked healthy. She had a resemblance to Sasuke and, somehow, Kakashi wondered if it was Danzo's intention to boil this pupil so well to counterattack the village with one of its most gifted shinobi — until, of course, he deflected and became a rogue ninja, a criminal and someone everyone hated, etcetera. Her body was sculptural and her voice was smooth, always on the border to gentle or sully. She had everyone at her feet, anytime she wanted to, at any possible way. 

Danzo raised her to be his image and semblance, in all possible ways. She had a strict vision on how the Fire Nation should be lead, how the children should be raised, how the laws should work. It was a dictatorship. It was a nightmare.

So, every since Kakashi fell, the Leaf turned into something between a battlefield and a military dictatorship. 

Everyone contrary to the new politic was to be arrested and tortured to sell out his comrades, their hideouts, their plans. 

They arrested children, pregnant women, old people, those who dared to manifest against or even be seen nearby the places the Resistance used to be seen. They arrested civilians. They killed open in the day, they didn't hide the brutality when they went to arrest someone, when they separate parents for their children. It was always shocking to know that one more kid disappeared. That more and more people were declared dead. And it didn't stop in the Leaf. It abranged888 the whole Nation as well as the other men they captured. It was a witch hunt. But mostly, they were killing their own people.

The media was censored, as all the things passed through the new regiment's scrutinizing approval. The material taught at the Academy also changed as well as the educational method. They were raising soldiers, emotionless soldiers. Truth was, the Academy was turning into the Foundation in broad daylight. 

But they attacked. The Resistance attacked. Danzo's (Kayq's) new regiment wouldn't take over so easily. They would fight back with all they had. 

Now Kakashi was their leader, they counted on him to lead them to the right path, to the restoration they deserved. The most fucked part was that the War wasn't over yet. Everyone was resigned that it wouldn't ever be truly over. The Allied Shinobi Forces were no more for many, many years. The Kages turned against each other more times than they could count, making and breaking alliances as one's changed underwear. The Akatsuki (if you still can call them "Akatsuki") was still on the run and causing all the damage it once did. And now they were facing a bloody Civil War and outsiders attacks and they didn't have enough men and Kakashi feared a slaughter. But today, specifically today, it was over —

because Kayq made a speech. 

"All citizens, I would like to have your attention." Her strong voice riverbed from the Hokage Tower, her slim form covered in the Hokage attire, the hat in place and, even if the distance didn't allow him to see, Kakashi knew she was smiling. "Our beloved Village is under attack. We are suffering with War for almost ten years!" A few people began to gather around the Tower, most of them were Foundation members disguised as civilians or regular shinobi, just to spread a false peaceful feeling. And, also, some people were "kindly" taken out the few restaurants and stores to go to the street to listen. It was a rule: every one must stop all they were doing to listen to the speeches. 

"We used to be a powerful, feared nation, but we are not a shameless joke. We let ourselves fall, we let ourselves become that ghost of our glorious days because of our" oh, Kakashi could taste the word Hokage in her mouth "new fame of 'peaceful land with peaceful leaders that think that engage battles are not a way to solve conflicts'!" To his horror, some people began to hum in agreement — and those people weren't her Foundation members nor her guards. "We have to stand for who we are! We have to remind them that the Hidden Leaf does not back down! The Hidden Leaf is not ruled by cowards, our people are not cowards! Remind them we are a powerful nation, a nation they should respect, a nation they should fear!" 

The crowd was wild at this point. What was once fear for her, was now some sort of sick admiration. Her words had the effect they needed, she was saying what they wanted to hear, what they thought they needed to hear. They were devastated by war, they were dying like ants and here she was, telling them they were powerful and now they were the kid with the lamp888 burning the ants with the sun and not the other way round. 

Quietly, it began. "Konoha! Konoha! Konoha!"

"We are proud of our nation!"

"Ko-no-ha! Ko-no-ha! Ko-no-ha!"

"We shall march into war with our heads high and ours hands ready to fight, ready to show them what we are made of!"

_"Ko-no-ha! Ko-no-ha! Ko-no-ha!"_

"They are the ones that should fear ours! They will never forget what the Leaf is made of! They will never forget who is the one that shall rule them all!" 

_"Ko-no-ha! Ko-no-ha! Ko-no-ha!"_

"We are the foundation that hold this shinobi world together, we are the founders, we are the gods of this new world!"

_"Ko-no-ha! Ko-no-ha! KO-NO-HA!"_

Whatever she said next, Kakashi couldn't hear because the crowd was too loud.

* * *

**six years before**

* * *

_January 3033, 3 years after the beginning of the 4th Great Ninja War_

* * *

The double doors of the Conference Room were thrown open with such strength one of the nails fell off. Naruto paused mid sentence, pointing at somewhere in the huge map they had glued to the wall.

"Everyone," Sakura called out the door, storming in, her cheeks flushed and her fists crumbling a series of papers. She crossed the room in a beeline direction of the Tactical Board "leave!" she shouted as she was approaching, her feet stomping so hard on the floor it left marks.

The whole room turned to look at her, that slammed her hand into the desk so hard it made a hole in the middle of it, making it sunk towards the ground, the table crumbling over itself, but not falling yet. Shikamaru fought to hold the extremities together as they placed the papers on the nearest desk, before all its contents splashed on the floor. 

Sakura turned to the small crowd "Everybody," she repeated _"leave!"_

The air was filled with the unspoken 'who is the Haruno girl to boss around?' mixed with 'oh, yeah, she is a mini Tsunade', but they didn't respect her quite yet. She had no time to that bullshit today.

Sakura took a deep breath, her nostrils flaring. 

"Kakashi, Naruto, Shikamaru, Tsunade and Yamato, you stay. Contact Minato and get him here as soon as possible. And —" she eyed the room and her whole body glew a pale green as her chakra took all over and the air was thick at just how angry she was.

"Eve-ry-one else, get the fuck out." her tone didn't left room for discussion. Most of the crowd dispersed without even needing Kakashi's nod of concordance.

While the few left eyed each other, Sakura kept her gaze glued to the door 'til the last person left and closed it. She then performed a hand seal and smeared her palm on the ground, activating the sound proof jutsu. "Contact Shisui as well and — just Hashirama this time." she finished without looking at them, yet, checking the room. The War was turning Sakura slightly more paranoid and she was perfecting the jutsu, to make sure not one vibration of voice could leak.

"Are you sure about Shisui? I feel like you are going to say some really, really top secret deep shit." Shikamaru asked. He still didn't trust the man completely. Sakura also didn't have time for that bullshit. If she pressed the papers in her hands harder, they would become unreadable. 

"I take full responsibility for him." Kakashi said, his voice even and that was that.

Naruto had already summoned three frogs to each get the respective man Sakura required.

"You won't need Ino on this?" he asked as he sent the last frog.

"No interrogation this time."

When she turned her eyes to them, they could feel what she was feeling even if they didn't know what it was, just that it was bad. 

Kakashi was the one that spoke, his voice calm and controlled as always. Kakashi was always calm and controlled, more than any of them and it always inspired safety. Without him as a leader, this situation would've turned into shit and even Tsunade admitted.

"Sakura, what happened?"

Sakura smeared the papers across the extend new table, the older one kicked aside. It hit a corner and made a hole in it. The papers were a variety that went from scrolls of mission reports, mission requests, autopsies, official documents, dribbles, medical files, numbers, old strategies (even the ones they discarded) and profiles. After she placed the papers on the table, she laid her index finger in one specific page, the one with the medical report "There is a mule." she said darkly. 

They all stared at each other and back to her, that also eyed every one of them. For a few seconds nothing was said, until Shikamaru, rubbing his temples, his eyes closed and brow furrowed broke it.

"Are you sure of it?"

She breadth fire.

"Yes, I am sure of it."

"Shit." Kakashi said. Shikamaru and him exchanged glances. 

"We were suspecting that as well." the latter said.

"Why didn't anyone said anything them?" Naruto demanded, his voice loud. His temper explosion was the closest to the Naruto they've known and it was almost a relief to see he was still there; some days it was just scaring how business like he got, even to Sakura and Kakashi that got used to him being cold when he needed to. "It is a mule we're talking about! It's not the fucking weather!" He motioned with his hands, throwing them up and glaring "This can jeopardize the whole—"

"We know." Kakashi cut him mid sentence and his voice was so serious even Yamato had to contain a shiver. "We just couldn't bring this up without proof or even a clear idea. It would just raise panic — and your voice."

Naruto opened his mouth, but Tsunade was the one that spoke.

"What did you find, Sakura?" as always, in this moments, despite the henge, the former Hokage's eyes showed her true age. Kakashi and her had that in common — their eyes sometimes betrayed them.

"I knew something wasn't right, something was off. I felt it since the first attempt, the one against Kaka" it didn't scape Tsunade the way she refereed to Hatake "and Obito. The attack was just... too good. Too good for comfort. We were only able to stop it in time due luck. Otherwise..." everyone knew what that meant. "So, since that day, I was suspicious, but I shoved it off as paranoia, but then it became too frequent to ignore. 

This mule isn't stupid. He or she isn't obvious. Not all the attacks or attempts are perfect, so it made it harder to see. It was subtle. The hour shifting of guarding, the schedule, the mission schedule itself, the shinobi that were and weren't on the village at the moment, where the missions were and how good the ambushes were turning in. Even then it wasn't obvious. The first four times it could've been pure luck or just observation. But it scaled and the attacks became all too precise to ignore it." Sakura lifted her eyes from the papers and some accusation spilled from her mouth. "You two noticed it too?"

Both men nodded, stern looks on their faces. 

"We followed your same line of thought, that all the attacks were too perfect timed. Always the right place, at the right time, to the right people. We kept low profile cause, as we said, we couldn't accuse or raise panic without proof."

"But now you have it." Kakashi finished and pointed with his chin to the papers.

"Yes, I do." Sakura looked at them all in the eye before beginning to explain, one corner of her mouth lifting in a wicked grin. Shisui arrived at that precise moment.

"Ok, ok, someone fill me in." He said jumping through the broken table and leaning by the window. 

"We have a mule." Naruto offered with a pout. 

"We have a what?! Really?" They all nodded and he looked around the papers on the table and then up to Kakashi. "Why isn't he here?" 

"In the papers or in the room?"

"Well, maybe both."

They all exchanged glances between themselves, not seeming to follow the line of thought. Shisui seemed furious at something. 

"He couldn't make it."

"Who are we talking about?" Naruto demanded. 

"No one." Tsunade said at the same time Shisui said 

"Itachi."

"Itachi?" Shikamaru repeated. "What does this have to do with this?"

"Yeah, Shisui, what does he have to do with _this_?" Kakashi asked in a harsh tone and his eyes were stony. Shisui dropped the subject. 

"Sorry. It would be just logical. But how did we get to the point of locating a mule?"

"The attack patterns." Sakura answered, patient, as she ran all the facts over her head a thousand times. 

"It first happened in the first attack, the one directed to Obito and Kakashi," she began, smearing one of the papers on the top for them to see it "it was just too perfect timed and placed. They got the right room number. I don't know how we overlooked it." she sighed "Anyway, it was the first sign. The attackers knew all too much and way too much. The attack was precisely on the turn shifting, the last before dawn. They came in a straight line to the destination, despite the genjutsu set in the whole village. They came to his room specifically knowing that Kakashi would be there. What they didn't count on was the fact the Obito was indeed trained by Madara fucking annoying pain in the ass die hard Uchiha and the boy sensed the movement before they touched the window. We all know what happened then." 

They nodded, thoughtful expressions on their faces. Naruto had his arms crossed in front of him as did Kakashi — which could only mean this was really serious cause he wasn't with his hands on his pockets. Tsunade had her balls turning into fists, but it was noticeable she was trying to hold her temper. Shikamaru, the only one that sat on the table beside her, crossed his hands in front of his face, arms on his knees and he seemed to be doing ten thousand of maths in the moment. Shisui was still leaning at the window, staring at the papers, his brow furrowed in deep thought, his eyes running up and down trying to read it all. Yamato was midway surprised, still, which made Sakura unnerved. Kakashi noticed it all too and just in a speck of second his eyes met Sakura's both of them read each other's mind. _Odd_ , was their shared word.

Minato flashed in the middle of the room, a yellow thunder. 

"What did I miss?" 

He had that warm smile of his with those hard eyes of his, never forgetting the situation. 

"We have a mule, sensei."

"A mule? I thought so."

"Oh, fuck me. Every one knew, but me?!" Naruto yelled, indignant washed over him. 

His father walked over him and said, while messing his hair. "What did I miss?"

As Naruto explained the situation to his father, Kakashi took a swing from the canteen Sakura gave him the last Christmas they spent in the field and read one of the files, his eyebrows knitting together. Tsunade asked for a swing too and so did Sakura, swallowing a pill. Shikamaru watched, but his heart was in the mule. Either way, he probably knew already.

Sakura looked at Minato and Naruto over her shoulder and when them nodded, she resumed talking.

"And so it kept happening," she continued "but, as I said, it wasn't explicit. Either chance or choice, it retarded us. Taking in all the 37 attacks, 12 had intel."

"12?!" Minato repeated, alarmed.

Sakura only nodded.

"That's way too much." Kakashi said. He was doing his own maths, as it seemed. Having him, Shikamaru and Minato in the same tactical team was such a win. That's why Itachi was a pressing manner. "It's way too close to half of it and we could've been damned for quite a while now. I don't think they're such a dumb group to lose all this opportunities, unless it was in purpose. It's a cover. The mule itself is a cover."

Shikamaru nodded slowly. 

"Here," he pointed "the ambush in Rice. Naruto and Ino were in henge. They were, officially, quoted as here, on a inside mission. And here" he pointed to another scroll "Tsunade was running the tests just in the adjatory lab they broke into and we though they've mistaken it, but no. Their intent wasn't attack Lady Tsunade, but to retrieve very, very specific documents on the counter effects of the Izanagi. It was punctual. It's classified info."

"And, yet, they knew it." Tsunade for once spoke, her voice trembling with all that could be anger. She was almost glowing, just as Sakura was, but she was feeling deep in her bones the anger of letting this things happen under her nose. She wasn't the Hokage anymore, but she was far from retired. She was very much on active duty.

Shikamaru nodded, but it was Kakashi that spoke.

"And, yet" the way he repeated the words had a hidden meaning "they were mistaken here and here."

"The caravan to Sand?" Sakura asked "I looked over it. It was a double trap: it was leaked that Gaara was in the caravan which lead people to believe he actually was and that it was a false lead, but they attacked even then. It is on the roll of classified."

"Yes, it is. But, as you said, it was a double trap, it was a bluff over a bluff. The said was that Gaara was in the caravan that was supposed to led people to think they said it so everyone would assume he wasn't when he actually was. But you know it was a triple bluff. He wasn't at the caravan and they attacked." He explained "The same happened with the Nara grounds invasion. Just a small circle knows that's where Hidan is, _but_ the location was transcriptase. They charged in the right place, but at the wrong spot."

"Which means?" Naruto asked, with his dumb expression of his face, the one he always had when he lost himself in the middle of the way. Kakashi sighed, but Yamato was the one who spoke, for the first time.

"They only have the access to a certain depth. Even in the trusted ones hall, there are precise info that aren't entirely true and accurate, as it was the case in both. That's good and bad news."

"Aham, so?" Naruto returned. Tsunade smacked him in the head. 

"The mule has access to classified, but it reduces considerably the number of suspects, given the exceptions. It is bad one of us is a traitor, but it is good that we can narrow the number."

"Not only narrow, but risk a few names, our included."

"No." Yamato said, his face blank staring at the mess of sheets. 

"What?" Sakura asked in a non violent way, but still demanded under confusion.

"It doesn't risk all of us. From all, I am the biggest suspect." 

Sakura gasped and her hands covered her mouth. Tsunade shakes her head and took a step back, looking at the floor. Kakashi and Shikamaru remained. Shisui hissed shaking his head. Minato looked like someone had slapped him.

"Oi! Is it too hard to explain? Why do you always keep me in the dark?" Naruto shrieked.

"Naruto," Minato voice rolled as a thunder and in the pale moonlight his imponence was tall "this is not about you."

"'K, sorry." he mumbled under his breath 

"It is far worse." the Hokage pitched the brick of his nose. _Thirsty_. "It is the Foundation."

"The Foundation? But aren't they supposed to don't exist anymore? And to be on our side? And what does this have to do with Yamato-sensei?"

"Because, Naruto, all this mission ran through the Foundation HQ. And worse" he took a breath before saying it "I was the one in charge of all of them."

* * *

**eight months later**

* * *

_September 3033, 3 years after the beginning of the 4th Great Ninja War_

* * *

"I'm gonna break your jaw if you keep talking."

"But, you see —" the man delivered a blow that cut off the sentence.

"Or just cut off your tongue."

"You asked, I answered."

"Your ass you answered." A second man said. "You just kept babbling about meaningless shit. No wonder nobody likes you."

Ok, that hurt. That hurt and it showed. They took advantage of it. 

"What more do you want?" It was hard to talk with so much blood in your mouth and there was some obstructing his nose where he was punched. 

" _The truth_!" He yelled and the walls felt like shaking. "And _I_ can break your nose if I want to. Or if you do want to. You seem into this shit."

"You're the one mentioning." He spat blood at his face, but the man had already taken a step back and it only hit his stomach. His face was swallowed and blood was dripping from his temple to his chin. Yet, he was baring his teeth under a cool demeanor.

"The girl seemed to like it."

It only took a second.

"Shut the fuck up!"

A bolt of electricity jolted through his entire body, making every cell in body shrink and burn. Although, he smiled. His teeth were covered in blood. 

It all happened in a blur, those you have when you stand up to fast and all you see is a blur with black spots. In a heartbeat all the tugs were at floor, his bodies melting into pulls of blood and black fire. The interrogator was now with both legs broken, so he couldn't run. As for his hands, this time was his time to set electricity. Years watching the Hyugas fight, you learn where are the chakra points. And while they used the Gentle Fists this was more of a Crushing-Your-Chakra-Paths-in-a-Way-That-Seems-You're-Going-to-Die-from-Pain. 

The tug just screamed, looking around like a scared child looks for his parents in the supermarket when they get lost. And he was lost, indeed, but no one was coming for him, now. 

"That hurt, h-hurt, you son of a bitch." He spat blood and two teeth, his upper lip was stretched to a point it was open in flesh. 

"Oh, sorry, didn't realise interrogation should be gentle."

"Yeah, I don't have your girlfriend here to heal me." 

He was kicked in his ribs, lying on the floor in a fetal position and rolled a few meters, groaning. 

"Maa, maa, all you do is whine. Was that what your mate said to my, how did you called her?, girlfriend when he _tried_ to get his luck with her?"

The man just spit in his direction. 

"Oh, come on, Copy Ninja. You know how this things work. You're quite known in our sub world here, did you know that? You're not just a living legend fighting, you are a living legend of cruelty. But come on, tell me." The man began to cough blood and his face was turning green. "Tell me, how did that feel?"

Kakashi didn't say anything. He just walked, crippling a little, since his left knee was basically open, to a metal table at the right corner and inspected the tools. He was thinking with great care what he would choose. 

"How does it feel to be such a murderer?" 

"Look who's asking." was all Kakashi said, still going through the objects. He picked an axe, some senborn, a whip, a small bucket and a plastic bag.

"Where are they?"

"Wrong question." The man smiled, toothless in the front and those that remained were yellow. 

"Wrong answer."

In one move he stick five senbor into the man's nails and while he screamed he taped him to a chair — the very same one he was tied to, boiling the metal. He took all the senbon at once and asked 

"Why the fuck do you even keep salt in here?"

It was a small room, the walls were probably white once, but now they were an ugly shade of brown, yellow and crimson red, full of dry blood. Same with the floor. You could see the white tiles if you tried hard enough, but most of it was covered in pools of blood and some boot steps. Five chairs were scattered around, the men on the floor, his bodies already unrecognized and a metal table full of tools — and more blood, obviously. 

When the man was too busy trying to adjust to the heat of the seat, Kakashi took his hand in his and dropped deliberately salt in his hand. The man did his best not to yell and Kakashi had to recognize that. 

"Can see why you were the leader. You almost seem tough."

"You're an coward." he spat on Kakashi's face, blood and saliva just a bit above his mouth — he hadn't his mask for a while. Two days maybe. 

"Oh, am I?" He heated the needles and pushed them in again, slower. "Says the man that _raped_ over 20 women, 20 civilian women that stood no chance even against the ones like you, that at least know what chakra is." Pushed it a bit further, his nail had just cracked in the middle, bleeding now over the salt. Kakashi was just as serene as a sunday morning. 

When he reached the end of the man's nails, he broke the first joint of his finger. This time the man let out a loud grunt. 

"Do you really, really think that if you don't scream you'll be decent?"

"So that's all this is about, isn't it?" The man began to laugh. Before he could continue, Kakashi asked sincerely what was his name again and that seemed just to fuel. "You think you're so much better, an elite assassin. Does that make you better to God?"

"I don't believe in God." The middle finger and the pinky at the same time, while the index finger was broken completely in half, the bone propping. 

"He wouldn't believe in you too."

Kakashi just shrugged, not taking his eyes off of the man's. 

"Do you always do that?" Cold sweat was dripping from his temple to his chin, an imitation to Kakashi's blood. Kakashi only cocked an eyebrow. "Ask your victims' names"

"You're not a victim."

"My sister was."

Oh, so that's what this is all about. 

"Yeah, you're thinking this is the only reason I've come after you." 

The man had a maniac smile on his face that faded the moment Kakashi cut his finger off with the axe. He screamed. Kakashi smiled. Twisted fuck. 

"Then why are you after me, ....?"

"Takeshi." He bit it out. 

"Takeshi. Nice name, indeed. Ever read "Make-Out Tactics"? One of the main characters has a very similar name."

"That's how you work, uh? Boring us to give you information?"

"You don't seem bored." He not only broke the man's (Takeshi) foot, turning it 180 degrees, but whipped it, chakra strength added. Another scream, throwing his head back. Kakashi was so unfazed he could've been watching a cat bathing. 

"Motherfucker!"

"Been called worse."

"Tell me how it was." 

Kakashi descended the bulb into the man's eyes. It must've hurt like hell, considering the put salt in his orbs right before the light hit. Takeshi tried to close his eyes, but it would stink even more. 

"Open your eyes."

Another whip, another cry. No eyes opened. Kakashi dropped the foot on the cold floor, his leg twisted in a strange angle and one of his hands with his fingers broken — so he blew totally the another one, opening its palm, the fingers dripping, hung, his arm's bones showing. The man screamed, but Kakashi left the room.

He searched through the hideout to find out it was hidden beneath a genjutsu he broke free as soon as he felt it. Being captured to extract information is always, as Shikamaru would say, such a drag. 

But those rogued nin were much more of a lead they had within weeks, so the best had to be sent (which was Sakura, but as soon as Kakashi got the word of _who_ was going to be there, he distracted her — more like put her on a complete false lead at the opposite direction; she was going to be mad, but it wouldn't be that fucked up, nothing he couldn't live without, like a liver), then he came. Find them was easy enough, they were a big group of twelve. The intelligence of the new Akatsuki was remarkable. They hide S-rank shinobi with poorly genin that barely could walk in water. Their only mistake was to leave a survivor. And that survivor was Sakura. 

He had to put on a henge, hide his chakra and get into a bar fight. After almost two weeks tracking them in a way they wouldn't notice him and would take him for granted. All in while the War was happening. It was like the Akatsuki had little toys paws and were destroying paper cities in whichever order they wanted to. Their movements were being too haphazard, there no loose ends. 

Until they attacked the Northern Border Village. And Sakura. Who the fuck attacks Sakura is a good question and that, just _that_ was their mistake. The chances were 50/50: either they attacked her 'cause they were dumb enough to do not know her or they thought they could catch her, once she was alone in a mission with three or four princesses. The princesses died as did their ladies — and almost Sakura. She almost died because she was trying to save their lives — particularly, the life of the six year old princess. That's where the twisted part gets in how the little girl died: she was raped by over three men, more than the princesses. 

When Kakashi rescued her, she told him his name, but he didn't remember. He just remember how low her heartbeat was and her breath, shallow. She managed to take down seven and hurt other two, but the rest got away. The true mistake was this. You do not leave survivors. No matter if you have to die for it, you don't leave survivors. Never. Unless, you don't care about what you're fighting for. Unless you're just in it for being into it. Unless you believe they were dead. Unless you killed them and you're sure of it. That's why.

After a good ten minutes, Kakashi returned to the room to see Takeshi lying on the floor, a big, big pull of blood around him. Kakashi was a bad boy and when he dropped Takeshi's feet, he made sure to glue it (more like attaching minuscule paper bombs that glued to his skin) to the floor. So, when he tried to escape, the paper blew and he lost the skin of his feet. Now, the man was crying. Good.

"Oh, no, no. What d'you do, Takeshi, my man?" He lifted up the shaking man and sat him back in the burning chair. He could smell his skin burning. Cause he was getting too white (and Sakura was an evil genius for showing his this technique) he healed some of his injuries, making the pain bearable and the body functioning. Just for wreck it all again. 

"Tell me, Hatake. Tell me how did it feel."

"I have no fucking idea of what you're talking about." He said while dragging the table to the front of the chair and then putting the bucket in it. "But I do wanna know where they are."

"Why the fuck would I tell you? You would kill me anyway."

He shrugged. "I can be merciful."

"My niece disagrees."

Fuck.

"Sure she will get over it." He was filling the bucket.

"She's dead."

"She got over it already then." 

He dragged the chair and sat the man up, tying his hands.

"She was eight months old." 

To that, he stopped.

Judging by the man aspect and accent, he was a Mist — no, Grass nin. He remembered the ugly mission he'd done there. There and all the Five Nations. He was an Anbu for ten years, he fought two wars. He killed too many people. 

"You don't even remember her, do you?" His voice sounded pained and hurt. Just for the sake of doing something to don't even begin to dwell on guilt, he healed his exploded hand, but shattered all the bones. Takeshi screamed. 

"Last chance."

"You fucker don't —" Kakashi never heard the end of the sentence as he drowned the man's head onto the bucket and hold him there. He counted to thirty and let him back. Takeshi was gasping for air like a reverse fish. 

"Anything?"

"Don't recall —"

More water and more time. He counted to forty. Takeshi was shaking his whole body, trying desperate to escape the tight embrace, but there is no pray for the wicked. Kakashi's forearm was strongly pressed against his neck, above his back and his other hand was holding Takeshi's hand.

Another deep breath. 

"I can play this all day."

He just spit and was about to curse some more, but he was on the water again. Fifty. He wouldn't last much longer. 

Before Kakashi could open his mouth, the man yelled in between gasps.

" _Tell me!"_ Gasping for breath, his whole body shaking. Takeshi was crying already. The water was too cold and his seat too hot. He was red faced and his lungs were burning. 

"Tell me _how does it feel to kill_ the only thing in a man's life!"

"I cannot —"

"She was blonde. She was blonde, blonde. She had dark eyes and a brown skin. Her name was Ari. Her daughter was Ryh. You didn't ask for their names. You just pulled their hearts out."

He remembered.

He was 18 at the time. In all the glory of his anger, all the glory of being heartless. They broke into a civilian shop and they needed to find a man — apparently, Takeshi comes from a bad family. 

(But, then again, what is bad? What is bad for Takeshi isn't bad for Kakashi. Pain once said we couldn't understand true pain. That the Leaf nin killed his family, destroyed his life, his country, but we were the only ones that thought that had the right to be angry. They were all casualties in a power game. Their lives didn't matter. Pains, Narutos, Kakashis, Obitos. Who get to decide who's bad and who's not? Who's the bad guy? How is this settled? Because the pain of loss Kakashi felt is the same pain Nagato felt and was the same Obito felt and was the same to Takeshi. Aren't them all to blame, then? He slaughtered his whole family.)

They couldn't find his father right away, so they had to play with the cards they had, which meant torture. 

Torture goes way beyond physical and, truth be told, Kakashi would get his balls ripped off for eternity than suffering with more loss. Psychological torture should be a sin on itself. It does play the trick, although. 

_Please, not my baby_ were the words that would echo in his mind to his dying day. And now he knew the baby's name. And knew he was the one that inflicted pain and loss at a family. 

"War" seems to be the perfect word, the perfect excuse. War, by definition, is pathetic. Nothing more than "a state of armed conflict between different nations or states or different groups within a nation or state." Just that. Just petty fights, that excuse it all and causes it all and no one has nothing to say, because war is war and that's all it was about. 

The definition of war lacked the depth of the loss, pain, grief, bloodshed, insanity and self loath that comes attached to it. Who cares about feelings, anyway? Shinobi don't.

"So, you've come for revenge? Why did you attack Sakura? Target Kurenai's daughter, a _child?_ An eye for an eye?" Kakashi stated in a low voice, burying all and every emotion. Takeshi laughed. 

"Oh, oh, the infamous Copy nin thinks the world spills around him, uh?" The man had a crazy twitch to his face now. He looked completely insane. All his fake composure was lost. It was a sight of a lost person, left in the Earth to rot in loneliness. That's how Kakashi sees himself in his worse days. "No, no, no, no. I am not here because of you."

"Then why are you here?"

"Not gonna tell." He just shrugged and just like that he was drown again. Sixty five. 

"Where are they, Takeshi?"

"Where is her body?"

"Answer me!"

"How did it feel to murder a child?"

He snapped. He hit the man's head in the table so harshly a gush cut his face and began to bleed profusely. He was alive still. Kakashi didn't know. He kicked buckets, punched the walls, broke the chairs. "It felt like _fucking suffocating!_ " He all but shouted "That's what you wanted to hear?" He jerked Takeshi's body up again and shook him. The man was out. He dropped him at the floor. "It feels like dying, but fucking worse. It feels like... It feels like I lost my fucking soul!"

He jerked Takeshi up when he sent a bolt of lightning through the water - enough to hurt him badly, but not to kill him. His body convulsing on the floor and all Kakashi felt was disgust.

"That's what you wanted?" He lifted Takeshi's destroyed face from the ground by his hair. His face was swollen, ugly bruises forming, bleeding and stuffed. He was nothing like the man he was at the beginning of the interrogation. "A part of my fucking soul dies every time, even when I kill scum like you. But you know the difference between two murderers?" He dropped the face, that fell with a _thump_ and was all ragged breath and began to pace around again. He lighted a cigarette and pointed at him with the fag between his fingers. "None of us has an excuse. We are the same kind of monster, Takeshi." He crouched to look at the man that was barely holding his head up to look at him. "But the difference is there I am willing to _die_ for them and not just kill. That's what separates us."

He put the cigarette between his fingers and walked away again, grabbing the plastic bag and lifting a chair, sitting the man in, not even bothering on tying his hands. 

"And now, my man, you will tell me," he pushed another chair for himself, sitting with the back of the chair to his chest, and put them back to back, sitting with his front to the back of both chairs, while Takeshi was hold in tradicional position. All that separated them was two metal bars, yet the electricity from Kakashi's body was echoing in the air, making all the hair's in the ninja's body raise. He took another breath and swallowed, the cigarettes glued to his lips. "Now you will tell me where they are."

Leaving no time for him to think, Kakashi put the bag over the man's head and pushed it, closing it at the back of his neck, provoking a vacuum. The bag was all blood and Takeshi's features, his screams muffled by himself and his own thickness. His hands raised to try to rip Kakashi's from his, but it was for no use. He was too weak. 

"Tell me." Was a command too far away, the cigarette following up and down the words in his lips. The man took all the air in the word once the bag was off and his hands went straight to his throat, trying to soothe the pain and absorb oxygen.

"Takeshi," he tipped the cigarette away "my patience is running thin." He flexed his fingers and his neck. Takeshi didn't dare to look back. Kakashi lowered his face and spoke to his ear. "You will talk, so save us both the trouble." 

When Kakashi straightened his back and Takeshi didn't move an inch, in one swift motion, he put his head back in the bag and held it stronger this time, to the point his face turned purple and he almost died.

He took off the plastic and the man fell to his feet. He had passed out. Kakashi kicked him and hit the bucket along. He stroke around the room, cursing. Still low on chakra, he had yet to rest to perform a good enough genjutsu. 

Lightening another smoke he felt a dull pain on his right thigh and looked down to see a lot of blood coming out of it, but no cut. He looked back wide eyed and the sight made his blood run cold. 

Takeshi was on one knee, a knife deep in his right tight, his clothes ripped off and all the previous damage inflicted to him was gone. It was replaced by a new set of skin. 

He was all black with white stripes. He was a skeleton, but not a bone one, just a painted one. At his feet, a pentagrama was drawn in blood and he had that maniac look is his face. He looked just like...

"You... You... You're dead!"

He laughed, that maniac high pitched laugh. 

"It is a honour, but I am not him. Lord Jashin took me as his follower and as my display of gratitude you will be my offering, Kakashi Hatake!"

Takeshi smiled and abruptly removed the knife from his tight, that had reached all the way to the other side, to what made Kakashi fall to the ground in pain, and lifted it slowly and ritualistic to his heart and sunk it at once.

"Now die!"

The dagger was long and crossed all the way through his heart and out of his back, breaking through his ribcage and spine, coming out two thirds. Blood fled from Kakashi's mouth and pain shot through his entire system, all his cells into shock, all his synapses shooting too slow, his ending frying, his insides burning, his heart pumping vivacious blood. His head hit the ground and all went unfocused, but he felt too much pain still. 

Fighting to keep his eyes open he looked at Takeshi and saw that the man was too at the ground and not standing victorious. He was gaping like a fish and cursing. 

"This shouldn't happen..." his hoarse voice said. 

Kakashi couldn't make sense out of this words before the man stopped babbling and died. He had the strength to stretch his fingers to his porch and retrieve a scroll that he got back when he went to check the place. It was for emergencies only and it required blood, what Kakashi had all too much.

With the last blink of an eye, he opened it and pressed his palm. The next second he was out — and at the Hokage Tower's floor, bleeding profusely.

* * *

36 hours later, Kakashi was laying in a bed, his face a scowl that seemed permanent and was raising to his feet to walk to the window. No one stopped him.

Two hours ago he finished the report, from being purposely abducted to being stabbed on the heart for death and the whole Tatic's Board was being summoned. 

They never used the same location for meetings, but the hospital room was a first. And, as a first as well, Kakashi didn't complain they were there. It was Obito's room. 

"Is everyone here already?" Naruto chanted, entering the room with much more grace and quietude one could ever expect from him.

"No." Kakashi said simply from the window. 

The news hadn't yet been properly delivered, but the rumors were enough. They all knew, but it just needed to be officialized. And that's why they were still waiting for the one person that never was late. 

After five minutes, Shikamaru opened the door and Tsunade slammed the scroll to seal the room completely. No one got in or out, all sound locked inside with them. 

A circle informally formed and they were all staring at Kakashi's back, that was still looking through the window. 

"Everyone knows why we are here. The rumors are true. I am only alive 'cause Takeshi wasn't well versed and trained on what he did. Apparently, the contract one takes with a God has a lot of trials, limitations, training and diverse offerings. By the research, Takeshi was too new to the business to try for a kill in such a poor condition, but it could've been fatal." The thought of Kakashi dying in such a simple mission would be laughable, if not for the scar in his chest. "We were wrong. It is not a fake." Even knowing, everyone's breath got caught.

"Are you sure of that, Kakashi? You said yourself he was just a copycat —"

"He wasn't a copycat, sensei. He was a new adept of the religion. It is not how we thought." Kakashi sighed and massaged his temple. 

The birds were flying East and the weather was changing, the winter was near and the nights were to become longer. The room was cold and silent, heavy with the unspoken truth. 

"It is true." Kakashi sighed and turned around. His eyes met Shikamaru's instantaneously. 

"Hidan is back."

* * *


	7. Chapter 7

> "The only way to **break** a good man is to take everything they **valued most** and **degrade it.**
> 
> The problem is you end up creating a **monster** , for as long as you live you will regret creating that man because he will be your **greatest horror**."

* * *

"Fuck! fuck fuck fuck _fuck_ FUCK!"

A fist slammed the wall and it run a crack to its top and for a moment there was a contemplation that could just fall over their heads. 

Hyugo finally spoke. After almost three weeks of interrogation, he finally cracked. Literally, as well. He's been kept alive for the past few days after he gave the first _noticeable_ info, they knew they just had to keep pushing and he would go from a broken dam for a trickle of water. 

But they had no time to celebrate. The fucker sent them straight to a bloody fucking trap. Fifty men died because of him. The ambush was stopped in time to leave few collateral damage, but deaths are deaths still. But in time of war, unfortunately, they couldn't even properly bury them. They just splashed some water in the ground around them, made only one cross, said a few empty prayers and they had to _deal with it_. Which meant spank Hyugo to death. 

" _YOU FUCKER!_ " Was how he marched into the room, slamming the door after him in a way that the wood cracked. All the eyes turned and the blood dripping on the floor was enough already to tell them "serious shit happened". Every word was punctured with a punch and every punch was punctured with so much blood the fists were goners and the pale hands were just red.

" _You"_ a punch " _killed_ " another punch " _fifty_ " one more " _men!_ " The last punch send his teeth out of his mouth and sent him into the floor, forming a hole in the ground. 

The shackles that held Hyugo trashed to the floor with the heavy locker hitting the back of the man and they would worry he'd might try to escape if he wasn't so beaten up. His face was quickly swallowing like a balloon a happy kid would blow on summer days — except four kids were caught in the explosion. 

All the eyes were wide, confuse and growing angry — even though they didn't knew what had happened. Their eyes darted from the man on the floor and up again. No one moved. No one tried to pick Hyugo up. 

So, he was lifted up from the ground by his collar and slammed into the wall (that this time crashed, a round hole in it, but now wasn't the time to the build to bury them. That fucking cockroach deserved pain at the very least.) 

"How _dare you?"_ It was a roar, it was an animal, it wasn't humane. "How dare you do that? Did you really thought you'd escape?" Hyugo was now choking, his face growing a beetle red, his eyes popping from his eyeballs and his legs were kicking aimlessly in the air. He was shocking in the pleas he was trying to say. The more he tried the more the bloodied hand suffocated him, the arm's veins popping with the strength.

"Stop." A voice pleaded. "Stop! You're going to kill him!"

"And doesn't he deserve?" He roared back to whomever spoke to him. "Death would be a relief to you, buddy." Hyugo was growing more and more slack, like a rag doll, his hands losing its grip on the arms holding him. 

"Stop!" A voice demanded. 

" _No_!"

"It is an order."

"I don't give a fuck." Hyugo's eyes were never left, being drown into the ire roaring, flaring. The red aura was strong enough to cast wind through the whole room — and it hasn't any windows. It was a spiral of orange and black, suffocating, too hot, so full of malicious intent it actually _hurt._

A hand came to his shoulder and immediately Hyugo felt to the ground, whining like a scared animal. The hands were still clenched, looking at the prisoner. The grip on the shoulder tightened and he was forced to look away, look to the hand that was planted in him, keeping him rotted. He made a move to kick the man in the floor, but probably his shoulder had some broken bone. 

"Naruto, stop!"

Everyone was shocked in seeing the ever so positive and smiling man in such a fury was like seeing a chicken kill a shark. It wasn't something that sounded even possible, let alone real. But Naruto marched as a mad man and almost killed a man, punching him with such strength Sakura would be pleased. 

Every time Naruto goes guttural is like unleashing a beast and letting it run amok. Few survive to tell its tale.

Naruto was boiling with anger when he turned around, the broken bones in his shoulder where the hand had grounded and stopped him already healed.

"How can you — you — you ask me to don't kill him? He —"

"I know what he did."

"How would —" Naruto's eyes narrowed and Kakashi grew over him, his height not being the treat, but his presence. The room was engulfed by his presence and the legendary murderer showed his claws. 

"If you, for even a _second_ , think that I would betray the Village, I will make sure to show how such traitor I am."

The quiet was suffocating. 

"Don't you see that's precisely what he wants? To made us turn on one another. Of fucking course Kakashi knew, but when it was too late. How do you think back up came? _Kakashi_ sent them. _He_ wanted to go. He was adamant about it, but the ambush was so good, it misled all of us. Each of you went _alone_ to the location. _Both_ of you could've fucking _died_! Just because you think you are better than anyone, because you are legends. But here comes a thing: legends aren't immortal, they're just words and a title. In the field, you die like a paw too." 

That was definitely the biggest sentence Tsunade have ever said in her entire life without breaking or throwing someone. 

Hyugo set things up perfectly: Naruto doubted that Kakashi knew about the ambush and still sent him there. Things were boiling up to the pressure point where everyone would explode and how many would get caught in the middle of it, it couldn't even begin to imagine. 

When Hyugo gave true intel, but fake locations, four teams left and only one returned. Kakashi wanted to leave on his own team, but he was held back. He would've died too, there would be no doubt about it. Naruto survived due Kurama and good timing. More than 50 men died, but they wouldn't tell Naruto that right at that moment. 

Never in his life he would doubt Kakashi, but they were playing with them, using them like toys. They've been away for almost two months now, with Kakashi travelling once in a week back to the Village to rest and reset the shadow clones and give more specific orders to Naruto's transformed into him. He couldn't keep shadow clones for that long. Because of that, at least once in the week the true Kakashi had to take the robe even if he did so to ignore pointless papers and memos and pay attention to strategies and visit T&I obsessively. 

_(And drink._

_Heavily._

_Without needing to hide so hardly._

_But no one needed to know this.)_

So when they captured Hyugo and he was the only one they didn't kill (but liked to maintain him in the same cell they kept the other five bodies — they were immune to the smell, but the prisoners weren't. It was effective) he began to mess with their head. 

They were keeping a low profile ever since Itachi and, actually, placing Tsunade with Kakashi was an astrondous mistake that only served well to rinse the tension — and Hyugo picked that up. Even though both Tsunade and Kakashi being actual genius they could only think straight to a certain extent and they made a mistake. 

Two nights ago Tsunade asked Sakura to replace her — not for reasons attached to Kakashi because, after all, they were adults and knew when to put personal matters aside — and Shikamaru was somehow always attached to them or at the other side of the world, no in between. This time, he got there too late: they had just left for the ambush and he was the one that noticed the inconsistency. If it wasn't for him Kakashi would find a way to rebel and run straight to his dead and wouldn't be able to call in Naruto in time.

Tsunade crouched and whispered to Hyugo, her velvet voice when she had an upper hand in gambling.

"You are less than scum. You are a fucking fly in a dog's shit. I even pity you." And then she kicked his stomach with such force that the ribs being broken was loud and echoed through the room. 

Kakashi signaled to Naruto with his hand for them to talk outside. They could hear Naruto's loud voice exasperated and ashamed _"I'm losing it, Kakashi sensei._ " but the prying was broken when Hyugo began to laugh uncontrollably

Blood coughed out of his mouth. Sakura kneed and healed him, without the plus of making it painless, her face as blank as a sheet of paper yet to be touched, the diamond shining in her forehead. He stopped laughing when she pushed back one broken arm in one swift motion and the bone popped up ripping his skin.

Tsunade and Shikamaru watched. 

"We will need a tracker." Sakura said watching Hyugo scream. 

Hyugo, with his black hair covering his pale face, his whole features contorted in a scream reminded her of Sasuke. She put a strand of hair behind his ears and when he looked at her with tears in his eyes and drool in his chin she punched him with so much strength his brains exploded and covered her and not even a crack was made in the wall. Her chakra control was indeed perfectly mastered.

Shikamaru tilted his head. Genius get confused sometimes. 

"And you called me here to...?"

"Not to be a tracker, brat. You need to pick four shinobi and sent them in all the directions, north, south, west and lest."

Sakura wasn't even looking at him and Tsunade was leaning on the wall opposite to him, her brow furrowed. 

Hyugo's body was already at a makeshift crippler and Sakura was already using her chakra scalpel to open his chest, what was left of his head already separated from his body at his side. She had already to place the jutsu over his body because Shikamaru wanted to throw up already, but that thought was around in the background of his mind. But the smell would always hit him strong in the face. 

"This was our very last chance of a alliance with the Mist." Tsunade said to no one or nowhere in particular.

"How so? He was caught in their territory?"

"Territory is no more when we catch war prisoners." Sakura's voice was dark and her hand was deep into the man's chest. Several bones were broken. She had a small notebook by her side where she was taking notes. 

"Why are you performing an autopsy here?" Shikamaru asked out of the blue only for four eyes meet him deadly. 

"There is a lot a body can tell." Was all Tsunade said.

"We can't even fucking tell if they weren't the responsible for this."

Shikamaru lighted a cigarette, not even thinking twice before lighting one to Tsunade, but questioning Sakura with his gaze — she only looked over her shoulder and he wanted more than ever for Sasuke to be there and see the woman she had become.

"That's why we need the trackers." Sakura said with a piece of cloth between her lips and then pointing with the fingers of one hand, before picking up the cigarette and tying her hair, without looking away from the body. "North, south, east, west." 

"Only four?"

"Yes and you have to pick the best."

Kakashi seemed to pop from thin air. No one even heard him open the door or walk on them. "You have the pick those whom will survive. They have to survive, to send us info, detailed info, but I wanted them all alive. So you will pick the best of the best. I want _more_ than the elite. If we say the Black Ops are the best, scratch that, find me better. Check the Anbu commanders, the Jounin Elite commanders, fuck, candidates to Hokage. Go through all the ANBU files, The Foundation's, _anything._ "

"But these are —"

"Confidential? What are you now, Shikamaru? Stupid?" He winced at Kakashi's tone. He never discounted his frustration on his subordinates as he always took everything on himself. _'That's what being a Hokage is. Taking and bearing the burden.'_ But right now he seemed beyond angry. The clouds outside were getting darker and, yes, Sakura and Naruto used to forget how he was creating a storm at the bell test. "What do you want to hear, Nara? That I rent you permission? Because that is pretty fucking obvious and needless to be said." 

With one fist Kakashi hit the table Shikamaru was leaning and one of the legs broke and the table was shaking. That's when Sakura noticed Kakashi's dark circles under his eyes: he _hasn't_ been drinking. 

Fuck.

"What else, General?" Tsunade sputtered. Somehow, Sakura expected a reprimand. He wasn't giving the orders to her and he felt his gaze changing and she could already taste the _stick to your work_ , the rudeness he rarely spared, but they had to take in. They all had. 

"How many bodies?" 

"Sixty two."

"Retrieve them. _All._ "

"Why?"

Naruto's voice came from the door and all eyes followed it — three pairs pitied him for walking in such time. 

"This is no time for teaching, Naruto. Either you know what to do or people die." 

Naruto had seem Kakashi worked up plenty of times, considering he was in Team 7, but seeing him worked up out of the battlefield was always quite a scene. His voice was deep and resonated through the room, no matter how low or high he came to speak — at the moment, he wasn't talking low at all. His voice was always strong and rumbled, just throwing right back at your face _he_ was the Sixth Hokage and it takes a lot not to shrink in his presence. Yet, you didn't bow out of fear, but out of respect.

"What got you so riled up from a second to another?" 

The thing is: Naruto doesn't learn to respect someone that earned its place as his superior. 

"We were just talking —"

"Because people are dying!" Kakashi yelled and finished breaking the table. Sakura rose to her feet, leaving the corpse. Both Tsunade and Shikamaru took a step back. Kakashi and Naruto weren't facing one another — yet — and Tsunade, honestly, wanted to slap some sense into Naruto for being reckless and childish. "Just today, in one miscalculated ambush, over 50 people died, Naruto! And you think you can solve things just barking in and spanking the man, uh? Just make tons of shadow clones and spam Rasengan until you win? I'm not even — And now I have less than one day to track them and have a minimal chance of something, anything because we've been stuck for _months_ and you, you… you're still naive enough to care about Sasuke! At this rate!"

"Of fucking course I still care about him! I —"

"Made a promise? Stop that. Grow up. For fuck's sake. You've grown, Naruto, you did. But sometimes you are so fucking naive. It is the first lead in months and you still have it in you to —"

"I won't turn my back on a —"

"He was never your friend!" Shikamaru for once yelled. 

Shikamaru never yelled.

There was no time for anyone to turn his eyes to him as Naruto made the greatest mistake people always kept on making:

"You did it. You turned your back and that's why _this_ is happening. If you, Kakashi-sensei, hadn't turn your back on Rin none of this would've ever happened."

It happened in a blur. In a moment Naruto was standing tall, barking with no teeth, just out of his dippers to hurt Kakashi, calling him in into pain even though he _knew_ how much it hurt to be the one to blame for the big picture, principalmente when it comes to the end of the world. The next moment Kakashi's hand was yelling and Naruto was glued to the wall and even though everyone knew he was stronger there was nothing there to fight when it came to this. 

There was four things people shouldn't touch about Kakashi: his father, Rin, Obito and — Sakura. 

Because he killed Sakura. 

And no one but the both of them and those who died that die could know about it. 

Kakashi's hands were shaking and his breath was ragged. He probably wasn't able to write his own name without messing the whole paper, his head must be killing him and his mood was all fucked up, making temperamental in a way that left Tsunade in the shadows. He was indeed an alcoholic and he was trying to detox. It wasn't working as well as they planed. They had it already laid in front of them: just use the minimum; you put yourself there; deal with it and don't harm anyone in the way there.

"Hatake!" Tsunade stormed out from her place, but stopped dead in her tracks with the way he looked her. It wasn't a comrade or a friend. It took him a second to drop Naruto and turn his gaze away from everybody. 

"Shikamaru!"

"Yes, sir!"

"As said, find me four man and I will arrange to get them here in a second." He ran his shaking hands through his face. Sakura wondered if he has really thrown away the last bottle. 

"You will have to prepare three battle strategies and a plus escape route _for each._ Each man and each battle. Offensive only if we can get there in five minutes. You have until tomorrow. Everything depends on it." 

Now Shikamaru understood why he was there. Kakashi probably had already some sketches, some skeleton of plans, but he had so much in his hands he was surprised the man hadn't fall asleep while standing (which he did, a lot) or confuse everyone's names 

(and call Kiba, Hinata (he also did it, a lot. Especially confusing Shino with Ino, but that's expected, except when he manages to confuse faces as well after spending five days without sleeping — that once caused him to call Shizune Shino and ask Ino to help him with stacking poisonous kunais and earned a black eye as stabbed her ass with a senbom thinking he was messing with Genma. In the same day he also proceeded to crash at Gai's place and steal all Lee's food, also calling him _Akamaru._ He apologized and said he never quite learnt the name of the new generation, but Anko bit him for all the times he called her not only Yugao but Tenzo as well).

Living of soldier pills keep you alive for a certain period of time, even that shit Sakura did, that tasted like vomit and horse's shit, but was effective. No one dared to question it after months. It tasted like every nightmare they ever had, but even Tsunade praised her.

Although, given their location, Sakura's pills would turn to be more and more aggressive to their system. She would be running would plants and her herbs were in enemy territory and stacked back at home. They couldn't leave just now, they needed something. Shikamaru needed to give then something.

It made perfect sense: if they ambushed them they knew where they were; if they knew where they were, they just needed to trace them back. Three times harder, but possible. Although, as Kakashi said, it had to be done as fast as possible. They had a day at maximum until they lost the faintest trait. The ideal would be deal with them within hours, but that might be not possible.

That was going be troublesome.

* * *

"I am losing it. I don't know if I can deal with all this shit. Being a Hokage wasn't supposed to be like this."

"It is supposed to be exactly just like that, Naruto." The wide blue eyes looked at his professor with a painful plea. "This is the world we live on. This is the world we _fight_ for. You give orders, you send people on missions — sometimes you send them knowing they will die. Most of the time it is about death and despair and there will come the day you will come to realize it."

"But Kakashi-sensei—"

Kakashi stopped him with just his hand. 

"Don't call me that no more. I am not your sensei anymore, Naruto. You are not a child, a gennin. You are a ninja."

"Sometimes I fucking wish I wasn't."

"What happened to being the greatest ninja of all times?"

"It isn't that. It definitely isn't that. Not killing. Not... not burying my comrades without even knowing their proper names. Not just realising someone is dead in the aftermath, when you call 'em and they don't answer."

"We've been doing this for years now, Naruto. Why is this bothering you now? Was it because you were the Captain?" 

Kakashi was tired. His voice was much more dragged than usually and he kept flexing his hands. 

"How do you do it?"

"I don't know." He leaned into the wall, one feet propped, his head touching the wall, looking up. "I guess you bury it all, pretend you don't see it and you do it as far as you can. You take this with you for as long as possible. This is the usual lies everybody says, isn't it? The usual Foundation bullshit. It is easy for me, I grew up in this world. Now for you?"

Naruto was looking even more at loss than before. 

"I do bury it. It is the only way, isn't it? Ever since. We learnt. We all did. But still… I guess I had dreams."

"We are assassins. Your dreams can only go so far."

"I thought the hat had some, some magic to it. Like it had the power to make it better. But when he had to knee in front of the old man with dry blood on my eyebrows, that fucking hat was a joke." He hadn't dry blood on his eyebrows today because the sweat swiped it off. But the blood from yesterday was still to come out. "A shame I couldn't burn it."

Kakashi lifted one eyebrow and snorted. It was hard to get Kakashi to laugh when he was sober. He didn't even read all that much, not as he did when they were kids. But then again nothing was as when they were kids. 

"It is only a hat. And it only casts a shadow over your face."

_Only casts a shadow over your face._

"After all," he began to roll the cigarette "the only difference between a shinobi and a criminal is that the former is loyal to a hidden village and the latter isn't."

Naruto wondered if Sasuke just didn't get it before they all did. He was a ninja, a rogue one. But he was a criminal, wasn't he. Although, the only difference between Naruto and Sasuke was that Naruto's hitai-ate didn't have any scratch on it. They did the same things, ever since they were kids to now.

Well, _did._

"So, I bottle it up. Like… like Sasuke did."

Kakashi's sigh was something palpable in the air.

"And then" he looked at Naruto and shrugged the same way he did when he was five "you cry."

"You cry?" Naruto repeated, as he didn't trust his ears.

"Yes, you cry." As Sasuke did. "And don't come with the bullshit that ninja don't cry. We're human, before everything. So yes, Naruto, we go home and we cry then we pick ourselves again and keep going. We are immoral."

"That much I've been thinking recently. I don't think Pain's words will ever leave me." 

Kakashi didn't ask why Naruto didn't call him Nagato. Pain was Pain and certain things Pain said and Pain did. Pain was a God and Nagato was a scared child. You can't have both. 

"We killed his family so he hated us. He killed Jiraiya so I hated him. He killed _you_ " the word was heavy like a bar crushing them into the ground "and he destroyed the entire village and killed so, so many people and I hated him. But Yahiko was killed and so were his parents and many others. Who was wrong and who was right? Shisui told me we fight seeking justice, but is there anything remotely taken as justice now? We fight for our own, but so do they. We are terrorists to. That wasn't a slaughter. That was divine punishment."

Naruto had grown taller and his whiskers were now scars. Kakashi hadn't grown a centimeter, but had now multiple new scars. They all had. Minato had new scars now and he and Naruto were so much alike, with their Rasengan promising death and now Naruto wasn't that child anymore. 

Life had killed Naruto Uzumaki. 

"One may commit necessary evil and be praised for what he had to do so, what had to be done, but in essence, they might be regarded as cruel and inhumane. Perhaps it all boils down to the intentions of the people committing morally conflicting acts.

"One may commit necessary evil and be praised for what he had to do so, what had to be done, but in essence, they might be regarded as cruel and inhumane. Perhaps it all boils down to the intentions of the people committing morally conflicting acts." Kakashi said with all the years his appearance didn't tell. "No matter how many times we wash our hands, the blood won't come out. Do you think shinobi deserve forgiveness?"

Naruto gave him a dry, small laugh. 

"Don't I?" He looked up at Kakashi, his blue eyes no more tearful or sunny. He was a man ruined and that was okay. "I am the Naruto, the boy that forgives and forgets, am I not?"

"I don't know, Naruto. You have to tell me that. How low can you sink? How much can you take?"

How a person can be a hero in one's eye and a villain in another. The very contrast between heroism and villainy. How much a single person can endure before breaking.

How much death and despair by succumbing to the cycle of vengeance can truly cause.

The breaking point of shinobi.

What will they decide once their hopes and will are crushed by dirt, will they continue to fight in the name of rectitude or will they stray from their path for one of despair?

They stood in silence in the corridor for a while, listening afar what was said behind the door — it shouldn't be supposed to, as it was a interrogation room, but apparently cracking the wall breaks a bit of the sound proof. 

"How do I do it? Just — how? I don't know if I can bottle up. I am not like you or like Tsunade or like my father was."

Kakashi offered Naruto a cigarette quietly which the boy took without a word. 

"Have you ever smoke before?" He asked plainly. 

"Yes and you were there."

Kakashi nodded passing his lighter to Naruto after the puffs of smoke he made. 

The boy started to fidget and was about to speak, demand, beg. 

"You are, Naruto. You've done it so far."

"Sasuke died."

He stated. Deadpanned, emotionless, like a _soldier_. 

"Sasuke died." Kakashi repeated, nodding, his tone a bit lighter. 

"How does that make me, make me anything but garbage if I couldn't save the only person I kept swearing I would bring home?" 

Naruto's speech was shallow. He was no longer Sasuke's puppy, but he still couldn't let go. Everyday, more and more, they had to bite their tongues every time they even considered calling Sasuke a criminal. 

It was a about loyalty. 

What was Naruto loyal to, in the end? The Village or his friends? What was Sasuke? Himself, revenge, any psychotic excuse he found to travel so far? 

Sasuke died a pathetic death and it was hard to mourn. In the late years, Sasuke became the boy who cried wolf and he had died too many times and they saved him, only to get backstabbing again. Until all he had left was Naruto. 

Then he left and Naruto stayed. 

And now it was over.

Naruto still had tears in his big blue eyes, but seemed adamant on not letting them fall this time. His eyes sparkled, as they always did. His hair was too long now, tied at a ponytail at his neck, a few strands falling loose, burn marks around his face and the tear marks were stained into his dusted cheeks. From time to time, Kakashi looked at him and saw those tears, but he never saw Naruto cry anymore and it didn't seem like he was posing as a macho man. It was a resemblance to Sakura, as if he cried his vision could get blurred and someone might die for his fault. The two of them never cried. 

Sometimes he wish they did.

Naruto was such a copy of Obito. The fucking crybaby Obito. The late and loud I-am-going-to-be-Hokage Obito. The dead Obito. The Obito, that declared war at the Shinobi world and died at Kakashi's arms, just like Rin did. _Fucking_ Obito and his two-times death.

Fuck the Uchiha clan and their two times death. 

And now there was Sasuke. 

Naruto wanted to cry about him, but he probably couldn't. Not now. He probably just did it anyway, but it was not like they had time to mourn. One day, Sasuke was dead. The other, they were under attack. Their autopsies were never finished. And that left room for —

Kakashi sighed.

"Have I ever told you about Rin?"

Naruto took a drag, his eyes burning, but tears retreating. Not just because he didn't _want_ to cry, but because he _couldn't_. He didn't have the time. Not now. He just had to wait for Sakura or Tsunade to finish mending Hyugo so they could beat up his ass to his chin until he spoke. 

He just shook his head. 

Kakashi sat on the floor and set his head on the wall again, his eyes forever glued to the ceiling, the cigarette shaking, the ashes dropping in his lap.

"When Obito died I promised him, as his death wish, his last wish on earth, I would take care of her. Then, she died by my hands. We were ambushed. It was all Madara's plan, but we didn't have how to know back there, none of us. He made her the jinchuriki of the Three Tails and planned on turning her against the village. She decided to sacrifice herself. She didn't communicate that to me. I would never allow it, I would go back and forth through hell if it meant keeping her alive. But she jumped in front of me and died by my hands." There was a pregnant pause where Naruto thought it was the end of the story and he assumed Kakashi only wanted to outburst. "I will never be able to erase from my mind her face, Naruto." His grey eyes fell upon him and the boy saw so many things there he couldn't put a finger in none of them. It was too much. He wondered how much that man had cried in his life. He wondered how he never had the same marks Itachi had. "And I couldn't come to peace because I _promised to Obito_ I would protect her and I fucking killed her." 

He lit another cigarette on the dying tip of his own and offered Naruto another which he took without knowing he wanted. When the nicotine hit the back of his throat again, he understood why so many smoked. Nicotine has its charm on calming you while dragging you. 

"I'm sorry." He whispered to the cigarette. 

"Don't be. It was her choice. And I was selfish enough to make it about myself instead of making it about her." His chest rumbled in short dying laugh Naruto never heard before.

"I mourned over my loss more than over her death."

They heard a very loud cracking noise coming from the room they left and Naruto wondered how they would heal the man if they kept breaking his bones. He shrugged. The more he suffered, the better. 

"You promised Sakura you would bring Sasuke back, right?"

"That's not the same as" _promising to keep someone alive and then killing the_ "what happened to you."

"No, it isn't. But I also promised Sakura, on the rooftop, everything would be back to the way it was. And it never did. It just got worse. And I used to torture myself over it."

"But that doesn't make sense!" Naruto said, heartedly, almost burning Kakashi's face with his cigarette with his ample movement. "You can't take upon your shoulders such a promise —"

His voice died and Kakashi smiled. 

He rose to his feet and tried to dust it off his pants.

"You've grown, Naruto."

"Being a Hokage… is not just how I thought it was due the innocence a kid has, but about the true nature of it. It is not shaking hands and just signing papers. When I look at you — sometimes, even looking at Tsunade I saw those immense papers and thought that was a bitch and I would be revolutionary, but there is no revolution. Even though, I guess I like the papers."

"You? Liking papers? Are you feeling alright?" Kakashi laughed his fake laugh Naruto grown to recognize. 

"Papers mean you are behind the desk and if you are behind the desk things are "good" enough for you to be there. Now I see how you are so good as a Hokage."

"And why is that?"

"You, my father and Tsunade. You all — you all are good at killing." He gave an unnamused chuckle. "It makes me think at our very first days, when I couldn't even hit the targets because my hands were shaking so much. And I couldn't wrap my mind about the concept that being a ninja means _killing._ That's what ninja are. That's what we are. That's what Hokages are. In the end, we are just military camps full with child soldiers trying to make out to see only the good part."

"Don't you think you're a little too pessimistic?"

"Am I wrong?"

Kakashi sighed and rubbed his chin. He had a light beard now. He liked it. It was nice to stretch it when he was alone, it was good to have one part of his face bloodless no matter what the day was like. 

"No."

"I tried to forge my own path, my ninja way. And it works, it is real. I never go back on my word, no matter what. But… I can't no longer keep the promise I made to myself and to Zabuza that I would be a reckless, heartless killer. Look at me now! I kill, what?, at least, when we're at really good days, 50 people per day and will do the same tomorrow and the day after that." He laughed and crushed the cigarette between his thumb and indicator88. "When people would tell me about War I thought it was just a word. A big word that meant bad things, but now… I wish I could've foreseen it."

"You cannot see the future nor change the past, Naruto." Kakashi messed his hair. "The answer is as simple as two plus two: Growing up and moving on, learning to live with the pain of betrayal and loss, learning to let go of the past and accepting nothing will ever be the same."

"So that's it for us, uh?"

"That's it. Sasuke is dead. And so is Rin and Obito and a whole bunch of people and so many more can die. We can die. We could've died today."

He began to walk away and entered the room.

Naruto realised a few weeks later it was the first time he called Tsunade by her name and not "Granny". And it felt right, for once.

* * *

**seven years before**

* * *

Naruto.

Was his first thought as he woke up that morning. He had to check the clock to make sure it was morning or not as the sky was a dark gray resembling the end of the day or the dawn. 0705 it read. The sun should've rise already, but it seemed the clouds wouldn't allow. 

He kept staring at his ceiling for an hour, questioning if this was real or not. For the past month, every time he opened his eyes, he questioned either it was reality he was seeing in front of him. He couldn't tell the difference sometimes and he knew his panic attacks were beginning to show.

His back hurt and his neck was stiff. He was laying in such an uncomfortable position, but he didn't want to move at all. Despite the sour mood of the weather, the wind was blowing sweetly and he was tired. He wished he could drift off to sleep, but he knew he couldn't. All that was making him sleep lately was the pills Tsunade gave him. And all that was making him get out the bed was the pills Tsunade gave him. And all that was make him do so many things were her pills. 

Putting his feet on the cold floor, he settled his mind in reality. So this was real. He was home and he was alone, no blood on the walls and no screams in his ears. 

Naruto.

His mind kept backtracking to him no matter what. 

He was the first one to notice. 

It was a stupid practice, just a warm up, when he hit Sakura's shoulder and an arteries, accidentally. His aim was perfect, so how he mistaken Sakura for a trunk was afar him. 

For his surprise, she didn't cry. Sakura sighed and summoned green chakra to her hand, making the blood spill a little less intensely, but, still, it hit Naruto's face and Kakashi's flack jacket, as well as soaked her hand. 

"You did good," Kakashi said impressed "but I will take you to —"

"No." Sakura said with hard eyes, but her voice wasn't squeaky as always or spoiled. She sounded like a real kunoichi and that was making it all worse — but it was astonishing all at the same. "No need for infirmary or shit. Stitch it for me."

Kakashi stopped for a second, about to argue, but then stitched her arm and she just closed her eyes. 

The blood was still much more than any of them would expect for a simple warm up stupid practice, but she shrugged off and righted her posture, back to her target. He could swore he saw Kakashi smile, but his vision was cloudy. 

He could feel the blood that left Sakura's arm leaving his face as well just as the air was leaving his lungs. Seeing Naruto's face covered in blood, Kakashi's hands and clothes as well as Sakura's seemed to send a straight message to his brain that was filled with blood on the walls, floor, bodies and people falling dead at his feet.

The air wasn't entering his lungs and he felt he was going to die. He threw a kunai far into the woods and went to pick it without uttering a word. Kakashi's eye followed his every move so he tried to walk with all the calm in the world when all he wanted to do was scream. 

He didn't notice when Naruto's hand touched his shoulder. 

"Sasuke," he was ready to launch at him, call him names, beat the shit out of him, run away, Chidori him, _anything_ , but "I brought you some water. You seem dehydrated." 

And he just smiled. 

"Didn't thought you knew such a long word." Sasuke uttered under his breath, drinking the water like a man lost in the desert his whole life. 

"Oi, asshole. Of course I know this word. Sakura taught me like two days ago when I thought I was dying. And you are such an ungrateful bitch —"

"Thank you, Naruto."

Naruto's face should be framed for eternity as Sasuke never saw him so shocked and wordless. Before he could say anything else, he walked away, breathing in and out as a woman from the hospital taught him when he would have panic attacks. 

So, Naruto, from all people in the world, was the one that noticed he was broken after what Itachi did to him. _Again._

He thought he could stay in the Village. He could learn in the Village, with his _friends,_ he could overcome his revenge or, at least, don't chase it by himself like a stupid maniac. He created bonds. Team 7 was his family, after all those years of loneliness. Even Sakura was, because _today_ Sakura wasn't _day one_ Sakura. Today Sakura was as much of a killer as he was. Even Sakura understood the world now. Even Sakura received several abuse in the Forest of Death, to protect them. 

But now his mind was wrecked, was broken, shattered. Tsunade woke him up, brought him back, but he was nothing but a shell now. 

After four sleepless nights, he had to knock on the Hokage's door and ask if she had anything to help him. She gave him his pills and now he could sleep without the nightmares, but he knew it wouldn't last forever. He knew killing Itachi wouldn't kill the nightmares either. A part of him _knew_ vengeance wouldn't change a thing, because his parents were dead and killing his brother wouldn't bring them back, but he _had to_ do it. Most of time, he couldn't reason with himself the truly reason _why._

Death would be too good for Itachi. Death brings shit. But that was his duty, he lived his life with this goal. It didn't matter what came after. It didn't matter if he died in the same fight. He only wanted to destroy Itachi, rip him apart. Because that was what he was supposed to do.

That's what he lived his whole life for, so if he ever take it out of him, what would be left? 

Maybe Naruto. Maybe even Sakura and Kakashi. Maybe even his pack that he had to admit he was fond of, even if they hated him at first sight and it was mutual. Maybe even the Hidden Leaf 11, the Rookie 9, the Village, park banks and smell of food. 

(Maybe even the blood Sakura had in her hands, dry and covered in mud to disguise it when she hugged Hinata after a mission. 

Sakura was made of blood herself. Her hair was the water running through the drain when your body was being washed out after a rough mission, when you were covered in blood. Her clothes were the gore itself that escaped all the lifeless bodies they left behind. Her skin was the very pale skin of their victims, dead, too pale after Sakura's clothes ran off them, too stiff, too _dead._ The scraps on her knees were the remainings of those who dared trying to run, the trees marked with despair, the explosive tags they caught in the way. But her eyes, her eyes should be the opposite, her eyes should held some life. 

Sasuke always thought that Sakura's eyes were the strongest weapon in her arsenal, shining bright under the sky, reflecting the flowers above the grass and under the trees she learnt to pick and turn into beautiful gifts and love promises, exploding like fireworks and better days. Until he saw the contrast of green and gore and the white of a smile underneath, the fog of being caught in a genjutsu turning into the victory of breaking free and the malice of enjoying the enemies' pain turning his weapon against him. 

Every time Sakura looked deep into his eyes he couldn't help but see that the very chakra that came from her healing hands was the same that focused on her killing and ripping throats like she usually peel apples when he's in the hospital. 

Maybe Sakura is dead and maybe that's why he wants to stay. 

Naruto was the equivalent with his blue eyes that matches his Rasengan that completely destroyed and turned people into dust — or just left holes the size of a growing tree trunk. Naruto's hair was the sun that always shined upon them and showed what they'd done, the mess they left behind, the trait to follow, the red trait that lead precisely to them. If someone's eye follows the trait of blood they would find _they_ at the end, all glory and gore, like animals — but aren't people animals? Yes, they are.

His orange jumpsuit was nothing but a reminder of when he peeled oranges under the trees after training with his kunais, imagining Itachi, but never quite realizing how much the blood sticks in your hands and if you grab an orange it will only taste like cover and you will be eating death. Naruto's eyes used to be annoying to look at, always too bright and happy, too naive, chanting he would never be a ninja because he would never be able to _kill._ Some days, Sasuke felt like he was the one truly soft and naive at all.

Seeing your clan slaughtered at your feet when you're seven should make you much tougher, but those two just proved him wrong time and time again. They threw themselves into the danger, they didn't hesitate anymore in face of brutal kill, they weren't mere children any more. None of them. 

The day they introduced themselves, _Sasuke Uchiha_ was cold and calculated, Naruto Uzumaki was loud and pathetic and Sakura Haruno was insane and annoying. Their sensei, Kakashi Hatake was slop and incompetent to be his mentor in his path to his dream. 

The very next day, Kakashi began to prove him wrong when he stepped in his head, making him taste grass. In their very first mission, Kakashi proved him wrong in all the possible senses as he felt the need to kill himself when he felt the intensity of his power. His fucking sensei wasn't only a legend, he owned his title. Seeing him fight made the hairs of his neck rise and his clothes ticking his skin. Staring at his back, he wondered how dangerous his sharingan would look compared to Itachi's. Sasuke wasn't sure if he wanted to see it — he wasn't sure if he ever wanted to look into Itachi's eyes again. But he _had_ to. And for someone at such a young age, Sasuke shouldn't have so much burdens in his shoulders — he should know how much Kakashi had in his at his very same age just as Itachi. But Itachi was a murderer and he didn't know shit about Kakashi, so the world kept spinning around him.

He was able to fight in harmony with Naruto and the next day Naruto came in later to the fight because he had to kill two enemies that held hostage their host, his whiskers already reddish, his knuckles already hurt. They fought Haku like savages, like lions trapped in a cage, bitting and tearing apart their tamer as he poked them. Haku was much better than they were and Sasuke thought he was the very best, the cream at the top, the cut above, but he was shit compared to the boy. He was nothing but a voodoo doll, his eyes and body too slow. 

Naruto was loud, but not so loud as he usually was. As death whispers in your ears, you learn to talk lower so maybe it can't hear you anymore. 

Naruto wasn't playing, wasn't asking for attention, wasn't playing a role for the Hokage title. He was _fighting_. His eyes that held sapphire to weight him down focused, trying to read through Haku, maybe even trying to think about Kakashi-sensei and Sakura. 

For a speck of second, Sasuke dared to look outside to see them and he would have it imprinted in his mind forever. Supposedly, Kakashi was to be fighting, gracious and dangerous, almost roaring, snarling, all teeth and all bite — and he was. Bleeding, but smiling. Zabuza didn't look quite so happy, bleeding as well, his eyes set on fire. There was too much fog to see anything properly, but it was impossible to miss _crimson red._

The same way Kakashi was able to be recognizable due red, blue-gray in his hand and his dark jonin uniform, Sakura was recognizable due red, as well. She wore a red outfit, after all. And she had red splashed all over her. 

The bridge builder had eyes wide and couldn't quite believe the tiny girl, with pink hair and blushing cheeks was now with a kunai deep into a man's eye, his hands choking her while she managed to pull another kunai from her pocket and this time embed it through his trachea. A second later, he couldn't see much of her, as she had to run to the side of the bridge, chakra control on her feet, to protect the man from another assault. 

Sasuke had to bring his attention back when Haku hit him with seven senbon. 

And as he thought he was to face death, he awakened his sharingan; he awakened his sharingan for Naruto, Kakashi, Sakura, Haku and Zabuza. As he laid there dying he told Naruto about his revenge, about his brother — about his dream that would never be fulfilled because he decided to die for his teammates and he couldn't find it in himself to regret. 

When he woke up with Sakura crying over him, staining him with _too much blood_ , when he opened his eyes to face hers — her weapon has still there, the sound of a thousand fireworks ripping the sky and his skin apart, shining too bright and so loud, like an aurora borealis and he could see himself, his souls, all of them, his staggered breathes, singing like leaves that trap you when you fall face to the floor in a genjutsu — and she wasn't looking at him admiringly, that was only relief. She turned around and smiled at Naruto, that was still at his feet, bright despite it all and she extended her hand and the three of them stood there for a moment before raising to their feet to face the reality of their actions and what their life was to be from now on.)

Yet, he had to avoid the Southern part of the Village, near the Uchiha Compound. 

At first, he began to avoid his house, for obvious reasons, but it began to grow with time. It was so long from the last time he'd been there, he wouldn't remember which closet he left his toys or if his parents bed really had a stain or if he dreamt about it. But, with time, he had to avoid it more and more, until he couldn't enter the Compound without feeling haunted by the ghosts. Now, he couldn't be even in that part of the Village, the part the Uchiha Compound and former Police Force once were. In all honesty, he tried to avoid a quarter of the Village. 

He wondered, some days, if it would come the day he would feel the need to avoid the whole Village because it was too painful — but he was tired of running. He was tired of running away of his memories and running away from his _fear._

No matter how much he claimed, he lived his life in fear, not revenge. He had to be good enough to kill a man that killed his whole clan. That killed his father, that was their leader, the strongest Uchiha of the clan. He had to be that strong, and he didn't know if he was ready or if he would ever be. 

He not only hated Itachi, but feared him. And he hated himself for it. 

Shinobi shouldn't be afraid, it made them weak. He remembered how that almost got him killed at the Forest of Death, when Naruto and _his eyes_ saved him.

"You're not hurt, are you, scary cat?"

He should fucking hate Naurto for that, but he couldn't. Because Naruto saved his life and Sakura's and he knew that Naruto knew about the Curse Mark because something inside Naruto could smell it on him and he didn't know if that made Naruto earn his respect or just made him scared — again. Because matter not Orochimaru or Itachi, the red cloud over Naruto, the one he'd seen at Zabuza's fight and at the Forest was much more evil, much more raw than both of them combined. Yet, Naruto never turned against him. He just saved him again and again and again. 

And when he tried to fucking save Naruto he came face to face with Itachi and all he did, all he trained had gone to waste. His Chidori was nothing but a lonely bird at five in the morning, before the sunrise, while Itachi's flames were the sun trying to combust the entire Earth. 

Now, what was the Village? What was there left for him? He couldn't keep playing with them, he couldn't keep there, while Itachi was everyday more and more strong and he was just a child. At his age, his brother had killed everyone and all he did was ruin a wall and had his bones broken. 

The most pathetic part is that he _wanted_ to stay. He was, for the first time in seven years, happy. Just as happy as he could be, but he was. He fucking loved them, not that he would ever admit, but he did. Every time he looked at the Team 7 picture he wanted to throw it at the wall at the same time he wanted to sunk his feet into that fucking leaves and s t a y. 

He wouldn't, though. He couldn't.

Sasuke was about to pack his stuff, when he stepped on a glass and it sunk deep into his feet and, once again, the blood on the carpet made him want to scream.

He didn't notice he was screaming until Sakura slapped his face, her green eyes so close to his and her voice was saying "Snap out of it!" with tears in it. 

When he finally broke free from it, she had both hands in his shoulders and, even though she was crying, her short hair made her look like someone else. Not like Sakura, but like someone else. Maybe they should find another flower to name her after. She didn't look 13; nor did he or Naruto for that cost. None of them. When he looked at the Rookie 9, they looked so much younger than the three of them and he couldn't put his finger in either this was good or bad. They had so much blood in their hands already, didn't they?

"What are you doing here?" He listened his own voice saying, his voice strained. 

"I came by to drop some other pills. Lady Hokage is working on them so they don't make you dependent on them."

"How do you know about my pills?" 

Sasuke rose from his feet, anger already creeping to his skin. 

"I don't know what they are for." Sakura stood up as well, not shaken at all at his harsh tone. Sasuke was rude 90% of the time so it was no surprise. "She just asked me to drop these for you when I went there to grab mine. I was going just to leave them, but" her green eyes always seemed to know so much about him nowadays, even if he knew she didn't know anything. From the four of them, Sakura was the one that knew less "you were" _screaming_ "not ok, so I got in and had to see how you were."

Sasuke didn't know if he was grateful or not for Sakura not voicing the fact he was having a panic attack that shook him out of reality. 

"How did you manage to get in? The house is well guarded?"

She scrunched her nose before answering. 

"Sometimes I can bribe Kakashi-sensei enough for him to teach me fuinjutsu. Your seals are good, but you have to work on them." Sakura smirked. "But you have our chakra signature on certain points, so we can come in depending on how good we are or the momentum. I just happen to manage both." 

Sasuke was at the kitchen and Sakura was running her fingers through the furniture, lost more in its shapes than trying to pry on his life. 

"When did you turned out to be good at something?"

Even if her back turned to him he could hear her jaw settle and her teeth grit. 

(Little did he know that once he left the Village, Sakura would fully become Tsunade's apprentice, developing her potential in record time, granting her the title of chunin just in a spackle of months and her leadership and success rate in missions caused her good fame. Sakura was more intelligent than Sasuke and he seemed to like to forget that, but some people didn't — like Genma, that once was her captain in a mission and noticed how good she was for someone in a such a young age _"this days, at least"_ , he said and when he covered his face again with his Anbu mask, she had to try to get in. 

At first, the Black Ops looked her down like she was insane, they knew she was _Hatake senpai_ former student and she didn't shake that fame off completely, so she had to work harder. Much harder. And it was then that she found out that fixing bones wasn't what was would get her in — it was the very opposite. 

"Despite being medic-nin, we don’t know any jutsu that could take pain away. People think there is one, because when we start to heal them, the pain is always subsided. That’s not a painkiller. It’s just the aftereffect of healing something. When you have a broken bone it hurts like hell, so when you fix it, when you put it back in the place, it feels you are taking the pain away. It isn’t like that. You are just fixing things, putting them back into their place. That doesn’t mean you are taking the actual pain away. That’s why we do have medicine, we do have painkillers, we do have morphine, we do have chemicals that are specifically for pain. Ninja are just stupid. They think we are goddesses. We’re not. We are medic. We don’t perform miracles. You can’t just glow your hand into a dying patient that has cancer and just make the pain go away. You have to keep this in mind. We are human beings. We need to feel pain. It’s natural.”

Tsunade said this to her after two months of training. She gave Sakura a broken finger and told her to fix it. 

One boy was complaining about pain and Sakura said “It will go away as soon as I’m done here”. To these words Tsunade gave her a very, very nasty glance. She gulped. She said some wrong shit. She was just thirteen, for heaven’s sake. All the knowledge she had of Medicine was the basic they taught at the Academy. They give you the basics for emergency cases. Truth be told, it was completely useless, just to give them a false sense of comfort. But when she was training under Tsunade, she realised she knew nothing at all. 

She showed her how to amend bones, how to subside pain, how to take poison out of a patient body and the most important: how to break bones, how to cause pain and how to insert poison.

So Sakura used her medicine knowledge on the field, not only to heal, but to incapacitate as well. She was proving she was worthy, she wasn't Kakashi's little girl anymore, but Tsunade's apprentice if that was what would take to get her in. 

After countless missions the ANBU would take her in, as Tsunade's protegé, into their labs to develop chemical weapons, until she became jounin, only one and a half year later she became chunin. A title that, at the time, she shared with Neji alone. 

They started as Black Ops the same day and had their first mission together. He was the first one to see her crying under that mask, but the first one of the Konoha 12 to see how easy it was for her to kill, as well. 

She was so much more than they told her she was.)

Sakura didn't turn to Sasuke when she answered. 

"It's been quite awhile already."

"Hn."

She fought her urge to roll her eyes. 

"Here are you pills. The blue ones are to take at night and the white ones are just for when you need them. And these" she took huge green balls from a purse and put at the table "are for you to take once a day."

He frowned. 

"I didn't take those" he pointed with his chin to the big green balls "before."

Sakura shrugged. "I don't know what you were taking before, as I said already. But those are some vitamin complex among other hormones and some plants as far as I can tell."

They both fell into silence after that and Sakura bit her lip so hard it began to bleed. She just noticed when she felt it dripping to her chin. 

" _Shit_."

"Here, take this." He threw a sheet to her and she thanked with her head even though she was going to fix it with the basic chakra healing she learnt. 

"When did you learn that —"

"We can help you." Sakura cut his attempt to small talk that was only making her uncomfortable. Sasuke doesn't do small talk. He doesn't do talk at all. She could tell he was ashamed she found him screaming. 

When the silence stretched and he got a dumb expression in his face (oh, she wanted a camera. That photo would pay rent for years) she answered his original question. "After the chunin exams, when Ino knocked me down. I decided to learn something useful and then Lady Hokage kind of helps me, even though, well, I wouldn't call it really help, but, yeah."

He kept his dumbfounded expression in his face and Sakura had to fight a blush or the urge to run away, but she settled it in her mind that she would tell him that and wouldn't leave until he listened to her. 

_(Two years later when he woke up from a nightmare full of orange and black blood and he couldn't scream because Orochimaru couldn't hear, he wished he had listened.)_

Sakura waited. She leaned against the sink, almost sitting at the top of it, the tip of her toes at the floor, folded her hands at her lap and waited for him that was looking somewhere behind her head. 

"What?" He said after quite a while.

"I said I learnt after the chunin exams and that" she spoke very slowly, in the tone Kakashi used with them when he was really trying to explain something they didn't understand quite yet, so he had to take his time and choose his words, speak with pauses and intonation in every word "we want to help you." As _we want to help you_ was the most complicated thing to understand in the world. And, for Sasuke, it was. 

He kept staring at her, his dark eyes held so much intensity she wanted to recoil and shrink into herself, just roll herself to a fetal position and stay there. But she wouldn't do that anymore, she wouldn't be afraid of Sasuke or let him walk over her. She was as much of a shinobi as him — and she didn't need a clan and a dojutsu to be a good one; she was going to work her way there.

"What even is there to help?" Was what he said eventually, his tone bored as ever, arrogance always dripping from his tongue — Sakura found herself wanting to cut his tongue off in times like this. He shrugged and turned to his oven to boil some water. "You know nothing, Sakura."

The tone he used was the same time he always used when it came to her: like he was talking to an inferior animal. Like she couldn't comprehend simple matters, like she was a nuisance (and she was, but she was doing all she could to change that), like she was stupid, annoying, like he oh so liked to call her, like she was so much inferior to him, the heir of the Uchiha Clan while she was no one but Sakurs Haruno, no heiress, no nothing. Like she was _stupid, dumb_ and those were things Sakura most definitely weren't. 

She did fucking wanted to cut his tongue.

"Your revenge." His back stiffed, but he snorted. 

"Like you could understand any of it." He turned to her and she never saw so much hate and despise turned to her and a shiver ran down her spine and she took an unconscious step back. "It was just like you said, Sakura. You don't understand one fucking little thing about being alone. How could you understand anything about it?" He scrunched his nose and took advantage of all his height, all his centimeters above her to look her down and shot her a cruel short laugh. "You're pathetic."

"Am I or are you?" She could feel the air around them thick and cold, the hairs on the back of her neck standing. "Or is Itachi?"

At the mention of the name his whole demeanour dropped and the kettle yelled, the water boiled, calling for attention. 

Sasuke stood there, for the second time that night, staring at her, no words in his mouth, no idea what to say. 

_("Kakashi-sensei!"_ It was impossible for her voice to echo, but for poetic licence, it will be said that it did.

"Hey, Sakura. Don't know if you notice but I am right in front of you so no need to shout my name so people at Ground 10 can hear." He didn't mean as an offense, as Kakashi rarely did (and when he did, it stung much, much more) and his eye crinkle could be honest from where she was standing. 

"Sorry, sensei. It was that I was just looking for you the whole day and goddamn, do you hide or 

"Anything to keep my beloved students training."

She just rolled her eyes at his excuse. 

"Anyway, I need to talk to you." She looked around and saw they were completely alone there, not a single soul in God knows how far, but she was afraid someone might listen. Before she could voice her fears, Kakashi spoke. 

"I know what you want to talk about."

"Do you really?" She asked, both skeptical and shocked. 

Kakashi closed his book and sighed. "Is about Sasuke, isn't it?"

Sakura just nodded. Without saying anything further he bit his lip and slapped his hand at the floor.

"Summoning jutsu!" A curtain of smoke emerged and covered her sight until a pug — that pug! — appeared, his ugly face as bored as ever.

"Yo, Kakashi. What's the matter?"

"Make sure the perimeter is safe. I am going to have a conversation and I don't want anyone to pry."

"Your word is law boss." As he turned to leave, he looked at Sakura and tilted his head — Kakashi does that a lot too; it is borderline adorable if you're in a good mood. "Oh, pink girl!"

Sakura's fists closed by her side because she fucking hated when people called her _Pinkie._

"I am _not_ pink. My _hair_ is pink! I am perfectly normal skin coloured!" 

The pug laughed. For real, he laughed. 

"Calm down, girl. I was going to say that we sharing the same shampoo is a compliment!" And then he vanished, remembering her she smelled like a dog. 

"Pakkun is just messing with you." Kakashi said as he formed hand seals too fast for her eyes to follow, but as soon as he was done she recognized he casted a genjutsu over the place. "It is not the same shampoo and even if it was I only use the best on my dogs." And then the fucker smiled as that would ease things. Sakura still smelled like a dog. Damn Kakashi and their brand of shampoo. "But that's not what you came here to talk about, am I right?" 

Sakura's shoulders slumped and her head lowered in defeat as she nodded. 

"Sasuke, uh?" He said without no carry in the world, but even Sakura could pick up the hit of worry in his tone. He wasn't as laid back as he wish right now. 

"Who does he want to kill?" Sakura asked in a hard voice, without flattering, her posture now straight and her eyes more mature and alive than Kakashi had seen since the time she shopped off a dick of a man they accidentally found out in a mission that was abusing a child. It would take ages for him to get used to who Sakura had become. 

His visible eye widened, nevertheless, at how straightforward she was. 

Kakashi began to walk and she followed him until they reached, just some feet above, a deep shadow cast from a tree and a place where the grass seemed to be a place already marked for being used way too many times — probably one of the not so hidden Kakashi's hidden places. 

"What do you really know about Sasuke?" He asked as he sat in his usual way — back to the tree trunk, a leg bended and the other stretched, one of his arms under his head, just with the difference that the other one wasn't with his always present book; he was lighting a cigarette. 

She wanted to make a remark about it, but just let it be. 

"Just that I fucked up big time once." Kakashi lifted one eyebrow as he blew off the smoke. He did look better than Asuma-sensei. She would have to tease Ino about it someday — and Ino would do everything to prove her wrong. 

(She missed Ino more than she thought she loved Sasuke) 

"Just as Team 7 was put together I said some shit about Naruto… some really stupid and reckless and spoiled little brat, brainless shit." She was pickling the grass with her hands, chopping big parts of it while she spoke, the regret clear on her voice mixed with anger. 

"What did you say, Sakura?" 

By her pause, he thought she wouldn't meet his eyes or would blush and just whisper, but she looked so deep into his single eye he almost winced. 

"I said Naruto was stupid because he didn't have parents and he had no one to teach him good manners and he was always alone and that's why he was a dead useless least." Yeah, Kakashi winced. "I kept saying shit about Naruto that applied directly to Sasuke, right at his face. And that was when he turned to me with, with those eyes… and said I would never understand what it meant to be alone and told me to fuck off." She sighed and ran her hand over her face. 

"Well, I have to agree you fucked up big time. Weren't you kind of obsessed about him?" She avoided his gaze and nodded. "How did you not know about that? Sasuke is known for three things: insufferable brat, prodigy and _the last of the Uchiha."_

"Ok, ok, Kaka-sensei, I got it. I guess my stupid mind managed to forget the last. All fangirls ignore the last. _Everyone_ ignores the last ever since he was eight or so. I went asking around and no, none of us even know about this. It was a fucking gossip that died. It is only known for the grown ups."

Kakashi sighed, but then remembered that Naruto's scandal was pretty much the same. Children don't care if you are a fucked up orphan. They don't give a fuck about it. 

"What do you mean you've been asking around?" Kakashi lifted one eyebrow again, wondering if Sakura wasn't digging shit that would just fuck Sasuke even more. 

"Relax." She waved him off. "I am not stupid. I just asked things like "Hey, are you friends with another Uchiha beside Sasuke?" or "Are all the Uchiha assholes?" and the guys were kind of confused, just saying they didn't know many of them. So I did my own research." 

Sakura said that with such intensity, Kakashi was sure she found out about everything. Almost everything or she wouldn't be talking to him — or she just needed confirmation. 

"And what did you find?" he crushed his cigarette between his fingers. 

"His whole clan was slaughtered," there was a pregnant pause. "by Itachi Uchiha." 

Kakashi nodded and the wind blew her hair all over her face and she didn't bother to take it out, just letting the wind go and then just sneaking her hair under her ear. Long gone were the days Sakura Haruno cared more about her looks than anything else. 

"And what you really want to know is who really is Itachi Uchiha, right?" Sakura only nodded in response. Kakashi looked up to the sky. A storm was coming. "Itachi Uchiha is Sasuke's older brother."

Her gasp was swallowed by the loud blow of the wind over the leaves.)

Sasuke still didn't seem to know what to say, staring at Sakura wide eyed, like he was seeing a ghost, like Itachi had bargained to his life once again without his permission, without his strength yet to be complete. 

"What the fuck does someone like you even know about him, Sakura?" 

She didn't seem shaken by his attempt to harm her.

"I know he is the older brother that killed your family and your whole clan cold blooded."

Sasuke went as pale as his tilted floor and took a step back like Sakura's words could physically inflict pain. 

And that was not what she wanted.

"Sasuke, stop. Stop trying to run away. What we want is to help you, not scare you away."

"You don't scare me." He didn't miss a heartbeat, his face had gone cold and stony, his eyes too dark to a child — she wondered how Itachi Uchiha's eyes looked like. 

"That's not what I meant." Sakura began to plead but either she stepped on the wrong toe or her battle was lost all the time — or maybe both. 

"I don't need your help."

He turned his back to her and back to his room, only a fair whisper of "Now, you can leave." only to be met with a book at his back. Sakura was holding that book and she had just hit him with it. 

"Stop! Stop this nonsense and this bullshit. Just stop it. Stop running, _stop being a coward."_

In one shift motion, Sasuke grabbed the book from her hands and threw it at the wall then proceeding to grab her by the throat and putting her up against the wall. It was hard to fight the feeling of redoing what his brother did to him, but he was not a coward and Sakura had to stop and leave.

Before he could open his mouth the body he was holding poorer out of existence and he was holding the book back again just as Sakura tossed a poisoned senbo at his direction. She looked fierce and she missed by a centimeter. He turned his sharingan on and she knew she would lose, but she had to try.

He launched against her, but she managed to block every punch and every kick, but was unable to launch any attack. She couldn't stay on defensive forever or she would look into his eyes eventually. For a speak of second, he retreated and Sakura formed two shadow clones, both performing the jutsu that would open up the ground and sneak him in — Kakashi's own jutsu — because she would need both hands to accomplish this feat, as her real self threw a set of shuriken and two kunai aiming at his knees, which he dodged with his own and threw back at her (except he aimed at her head and chest) and just as she was about to grab her feat she heard it. 

Too many birds.

Too many at the same time. 

Lightening beats Earth. 

Sasuke beats Sakura. 

Sasuke was about to kill her without a care in the world, attacking her like an enemy, like he attacked Gaara, like Naruto told her he attacked his brother. 

She wouldn't be able to dodge it at time. 

She would die by the hands of the man she loved.


End file.
